Green’s Dictionary of Slang

take v.

1. (also take on) to swindle, to cheat, to extort money from; often ext. as take someone for

[UK]Foote The Bankrupt II ii: resource: A scheme of his, to monopolize sprats and potatoes. pillage: And it took? resource: Oh! there was no danger of that.
[UK]Dickens Oliver Twist (1966) 238: I say [...] what a time this would be for a sell! I’ve got Phil Barker here: so drunk, that a boy might take him.
[UK]A. Morrison Child of the Jago (1982) 50: It’s the mugs wot git took [...] An’ quoddin’ ain’t so bad.
[US]F. Hutchison Philosophy of Johnny the Gent 17: ‘You always back out after you’ve been took. Why don’t you ever get hep sometime[?]’.
[US]J. Lait ‘Canada Kid’ Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 176: You what used to trim smart-Alec get-rich-quick guys an’ take the dicks what come after you. You’ve flopped a long way.
[US]J. Callahan Man’s Grim Justice 142: She really took me, hook, line and sinker.
[US]‘Paul Cain’ Fast One (1936) 57: ‘I’m going to take the city back’ - he paused, and then, very pointedly made the pun - ‘like [Clara] Bow took [Harry] Richman’.
[US]W. Winchell ‘On Broadway’ 31 Mar. [synd. col.] Norma Taylor [...] has complained to the D.A. about a British nobleman, claiming he ‘took’ her for $!),000 in a phony olil stock racket.
[US]A.J. Liebling Honest Rainmaker (1991) 71: They took him good [and] my friends’ circumstances were stringent.
[UK]I. Fleming Diamonds Are Forever (1958) 103: You’ve got it easy with this crooked play-off at the blackjack table. You’ll be able to [...] tell the story of how you took ’em at the Tiara.
L. Schecter Jocks 250: Still another [reason] is that the bookmaker does know something and is looking to take the other bookmakers.
[US]‘Iceberg Slim’ Airtight Willie and Me 113: You were a dirty Nigger Red, to burn me like you did last year when we took those Dagos.
[UK]J. Sullivan ‘The Yellow Peril’ Only Fools and Horses [TV script] I know, the owner bought them cheap, he got well taken on, it’s a load of rubbish.
[US](con. 1970s) G. Pelecanos King Suckerman (1998) 70: He had been taken enough times not to make the same mistake again.
[UK]K. Sampson Outlaws (ms.) 35: They don’t want to think that some lad with spots can stand there under their own roof and take off’ve them.
[Aus]C. Hammer Opal Country 420: [T]he man is in denial, doesn’t want to hear he’s been comprehensively taken.

2. to overcome, to defeat, to kill.

[US]H.L. Williams Gay Life in N.Y. 88: I ain’t no sucker — my money is good and I’ll bet my ‘ducats’ that the smasher can take any of the crowd agin him.
[US]Chicago Inter-Ocean 11 June 8/1: They Take Troy, The Chicago Club Does Vanquish the Nine of That Classic Village [DA].
[US]J. Lait ‘The Gangster’s Elegy’ Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 242: It got pretty hot aroun’ ’lection an’ it looks like our alderman is gonna get took good.
[US]W.R. Burnett Little Caesar (1932) 186: You think I’m gonna let ’em take me like I was purse-snatcher on his first stand.
[US]R. Chandler ‘Pearls Are a Nuisance’ Spanish Blood (1946) 128: Without me along they would take you the way the cat took the canary.
[US](con. 1944) N. Mailer Naked and Dead 289: The only guy you could take is Roth.
[US]Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 14: A member of a Jewish gang affiliated with the Crime Cartel may not ‘take’ an Italian without the permission of the Mafia, nor may the Sicilians kill a Jew.
[UK]J. Iggulden Storms of Summer 66: Ya took that big bloke like a bag of wet turds.
[US]E. Bullins ‘Dandy’ in King Black Short Story Anthol. (1972) 71: I can take this little punk anytime I want!
[US]T. Wolff (con. mid-1950s) This Boy’s Life 108: He was bigger than me, especially around the middle, but I factored out this weight as blubbe.
[US](con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 326: I’m gonna let him think he can take me, then shiv him.
[Aus]G. Disher Crosskill [ebook] ‘Stupid fucker reckoned he’d be able to take you’.
[UK]N. Barlay Curvy Lovebox 180: Maybe I could take him.
[UK]K. Sampson Outlaws (ms.) 108: I can take him, no bother, but I’m going to have to take him quick.
[Aus]G. Disher Kill Shot [ebook] ‘You must really hate Kramer.’ [...] ‘Yeah, so?’ ‘Could you take him?’.
[US](con. 1963) L. Berney November Road 250: On a good day, he’d take Joey nine times out of ten, even Joey with a piece and Barone without one.

3. to accept bribery.

[US]Phila. Eve. Bulletin 5 Oct. 40/1: Whaddaya mean! Are yuh getting th’ snakes? Th’ bulls are taking it, ain’t they?
[US]A.J. Liebling ‘The Jollity Building’ in Just Enough Liebling (2004) 251: It’s all right, Mrs. Van Schuyler, we got the shooflies taking now.
[US]Goldin et al. DAUL 217/2: Take, v. [...] 2. To accept a bribe. ‘Spring (talk) to the sheriff. He takes if he knows you are right (loyal to the underworld).’.
[US]J. Scarne Complete Guide to Gambling.
[US]L. Shecter On the Pad 95: If I’m an old-timer in a car and they put you in the car with me and you don’t take, boom, [...] I say take that guy out of my car.
[UK]G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 15: How much Judge Keaton had taken from Manso, Sneed didn’t even speculate [...] but certainly it would have been five figures [...] Another certainty was that he hadn’t taken anything when Manso’s time had fallen due, or allowed past favours to influence him.
[US](con. 1986) G. Pelecanos Sweet Forever 68: Kevin Murphy didn’t think on it all that long. He began to take.

4. to break in, to rob.

[US]‘Digit’ Confessions of a Twentieth Century Hobo 46: Finding out the best place to take her, we proceeded there and waited.
[US]D. Runyon ‘Hottest Guy in the World’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 358: Somebody takes a jewellery store in town.
[US]R. Chandler Farewell, My Lovely (1949) 19: He used a gun to take that bank, didn’t he?
[US](con. 1944) H. Robbins A Stone for Danny Fisher 295: I was tooken [...] I got hijacked on the way and dumped in a ditch.
[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Apr. 45: Marg pussies in to slew the manager and Ratty Jack is stallin’ close by waitin’ to entertain the mugs with his fit bit. I was gonna take.

5. to confront, to attack.

[[UK]J. Dalton Narrative of Street-Robberies 8: Branch, pulling out a Knife, said, I’ll Chive him; Dalton said, Chive away, or I’ll take him a Peg in the Face].
[US]Phila. Inquirer 16 June n.p.: An essential part of the ‘toughie’s’ vocabulary is the verb ‘to cream.’ This verb has synonyms which make its meaning plain: To ‘knock cold,’ to ‘cool,’ to ‘beat up on’ and to ‘take.’ [...] A thing or a person which has been ‘creamed’ has been successfully treated in a violent manner.
[US]R. Chandler Big Sleep 56: ‘Take him,’ I told my driver.
[US]‘Hal Ellson’ Tomboy (1952) 69: There’s an old phony on a bench down the path and he’s going to be taken.
[US]‘William Lee’ Junkie (1966) 47: When you take a lush on the car [...] you got to gauge yourself to the movement of the car.
[US]E. Tidyman Shaft 12: Take him first [...] I’m too old for you.
[US]H. Gould Fort Apache, The Bronx 329: Don’t try to take these guys if you don’t have to.
[UK]J. Cameron Vinnie Got Blown Away 147: Thursday on association was when we took him, always plenty of noise off Top of the Pops. So we got him in the shithouse, kicked fuck out of him.
[US]S.A. Cosby ‘Grandpa’s Place’ in ThugLit Sept. [ebook] ‘So we taking the vape shop’ [...] ‘Naw. Cutter must not be ready to go to war [...] just yet’.

In compounds

take man (n.)

(Aus. Und.) in a shoplifting team, the member who actually steals the targeted object.

[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Apr. 45: Marg and Ratty Jack was gonna smother with a big box while Limp tugged the goose behind the counter. I was take man behind the box.

In phrases

take it (v.)

(US Und.) to accept a bribe.

[US]Phila. Eve. Bulletin 5 Oct. 40/5: Here are a few more terms and definitions from the ‘Racket’ vocabulary: [...] ‘take it,’ to accept bribes.
take someone for (v.)

to trick, to deceive, to obtain from one who is unwilling otherwise to give, esp. in the extraction of money, e.g. I took him for a tenner.

[US]‘Paul Cain’ ‘One, Two, Three’ in Penzler Pulp Fiction (2006) 3: He’d taken a railroad company in Quebec for [...] a hundred and fifty grand.
[UK]G. Kersh Night and the City 258: The only thing to do is to take Fabian for what he’s worth.
[US](con. 1944) N. Mailer Naked and Dead 10: There just wasn’t any fun in it [...] to take a man for all the money he had.
[US]W. Brown Run, Chico, Run (1959) 37: He’d heard cracks on the block about how his old man made his living – picking up society trims in night clubs, giving them a good time and then taking them for the contents of their purse.
[US]J. Rechy City of Night 196: He took that auntie for every cent, then he threw him out.
[US]G.V. Higgins Cogan’s Trade (1975) 76: He’s only taking guys that want to get taken and he don’t kill it [...] He don’t take them for a lot.
[US]Tom Petty ‘Yer So Bad’ 🎵 My sister got lucky, / married a yuppie / Took him for all he was worth.
[US]C. Hiaasen Stormy Weather 33: ‘How big a piece, darling?’ ‘Whatever we could take you for.’.
[US]J. Ellroy ‘Jungletown Jihad’ in Destination: Morgue! (2004) 366: Her old man’s a macher at Paramount and we took her for forty K.

SE in slang uses

In phrases

don’t take me there

(US teen) I am not interested, I don’t want to hear it.

[US]Eble Campus Sl. Apr.
M. Hirsch in Minnesota Women’s Press 22 July 🌐 Another friend, Sue, will stop me in the middle of yet another mesmerizing story and say, ‘Don’t take me there.’.
[US]GweepCo Cooperative Network 🌐 Don’t Take Me There — [...] If someone brings up a thread of conversation that starts to bring YOU down, like mentioning the time your ex boyfriend wore plaid to your graduation, you can remind them that it’s not a good subject by saying ‘Don’t Take Me There.’.
do you take?

US do you understand? i.e do you take the point?

[US]Ely’s Hawk & Buzzard (NY) 16 Mar. n.p.: I wish you would inform a young would-be gentleman [that] I would like the payment of my bill. Do you take, Mr. C— [ibid.] Do you take, you blackbguard Snipe Simpleton.
[US]Flash (NY) 23 June n.p.: brooklyn Wants to Know [...] whether those prostitutes have got it all. Do you take, Shorty.
[US]Manchester Spy (NH) 19 Apr. n.p.: Do you take, you suckers.
take... (v.)

see also under relevant n. or adj.

take a leap at Tyburn (v.)

see under Tyburn n.

take a leap in the dark (v.) [note T. Brown (1702): ‘A brother player, who pretends he received all his memoirs from your own mouth, a little before you made a leap into the dark’, where the phr. simply means ‘to die’]

to be hanged.

[UK] in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy VI 327: All you that must take a leap in the Dark, Pity the Fate of Lawson and Clark.
[US]Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 28 Nov. 8: [pic. caption] Exit Riel! The Canadian Arch Rebel Takes One More Leap into the Dark and Stays There.
[UK]Gent.’s Mag. 367: The Gallows has, on the whole, been the commonest form of punishment [...] which is shown by the number of [it’s] synonyms [...] — be twisted — to be stringed upon Tyburn tree — to take a leap in the dark.
(con. 1788) E.B. Simpson Robert Louis Stevenson Originals 109: [Deacon Brodie] gaily said he was going to take a leap in the dark.
take an application (v.)

(US) to interview a woman as a prospective prostitute.

[US]Milner & Milner Black Players 40: In this vein, a pimp says he ‘took a bitch’s application to see if she was qualified,’ meaning he questioned her thoroughly to determine whether she was a bona fide whore.
[US]A.K. Shulman On the Stroll 233: Take an application from anyone you can find, advised Sweet Rudy.
take a pen’north (excl.)

(UK und.) to leave, thus an excl. of dismissal: ‘go away!’.

[UK]P. Hoskins No Hiding Place! 192/1: Take a pen’north. Run away. As an injunction: ‘Beat it!’.

In phrases

take a turn among her frills (v.) (also …up her petticoats)

to have sexual intercourse.

[UK]Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
[US]Maledicta IV:2 (Winter) 197: The terms used for copulating […] are not really euphemistic because it is implicit that no ambiguity could possibly result and, unlike euphemisms, they are, or used to be, avoided in polite, mixed company. Related to this group are the allusive […] to take a turn among her frills.
take into/to the woodshed (v.) [the practice of taking an errant child into the woodshed for a thrashing]

(US) to scold, to punish.

[US]D. Jenkins Life Its Ownself 193: ‘It’s first down, Packers. They look like they’re ready to take somebody to the woodshed, Billy Clyde Puckett!’.
Mr Maloway Canadian Parliament 16 Sept. 🌐 The Premier was so aghast at this that he took him into the woodshed, and he came out quite chaste for a few years after that.
L. Tye Satchel 187: The commissioner took the Dodgers’ Leo Durocher to the woodshed for embracing the signing of black players.
take low (v.)

(W.I./US black) to adopt a humble attitude in order to forward one’s aims.

G.A. Crofutt Guide to Colorado 63: The Spanish Peaks, too, took low.
[US]Hughes & Bontemps Book of Negro Folklore 488: take low : To be humiliated. Women love to see a man take low.
[US]N. Heard Howard Street 89: Few Streeters take low, especially with a woman around to witness it.
[US]D. Wells Night People 96: Don’t take low from no jive cop.
[WI](con. 1950s) M. Thelwell Harder They Come 53: A spirit of compromise, to bite one’s tongue, to ‘take low’, to be flexible, was the most important quality that life taught.
take one’s degrees (v.) [play on academy n. (4)]

to be imprisoned, to serve a sentence.

[UK]‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 65: A jail-bird is said to have taken his degrees who has inhabited one of those ‘academies’ called starts: he is entered and matriculated by a whipping bout; three months quod makes him an under-graduate; six months a batchelor of arts; twelve months more is the gradu doctoris towards his final promotion.
take one’s end (v.) [SE end, death, i.e. ‘to laugh oneself to death’]

(Irish) to be convulsed with laughter.

[Ire]L. Doyle Ballygullion (1927) 24: Ye’d ha’ taken your end at her.
take outdoors on someone (v.)

to leave alone, to avoid someone.

[US]D. Runyon ‘The Three Wise Guys’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 401: Miss Clarabelle Cobb takes plenty of outdoors on Blondy Swanson.
take over the hurdles (v.) [horseracing imagery]

(US prison) to attack in a group.

[US]Goldin et al. DAUL 219/1: Take (one) over the hurdles. 1. To subject to an ordeal, as in a third degree examination; to abuse or persecute; to use violence upon. [...] 2. (P) To subject a convict to abuse or persecution, as to a difficult or disagreeable work assignment; to cheat, abuse or harrass, a fellow convict.
take shirrocker (v.)

(Aus. und.) to run off.

[Aus]Truth (Perth) 2 Jan. 4/8: But I nevver did see noth’n / So I thinks they has been done; / And has had to take shi[?]rrocker / Jest afore they had begun.
take (someone) apart (v.)

1. to beat severely.

[US]S.E. White Blazed Trail 160: ’Spose you go over and take ’em apart; what then? You have a scrap; probably you lick ’em [...] You whale daylights out of a lot of men who probably don’t know any more about this here shooting of our dams than a hog does about a ruffled shirt.
[US]Van Loan ‘Sporting Doctor’ in Taking the Count 57: We’re going to take that guy apart a joint at a time.
[US]F.C. Painton ‘The Devil Must Pay’ in Goodstone Pulps (1970) 18/2: If I really start on you, I’ll take you apart.
[UK]S. Jackson An Indiscreet Guide to Soho 118: A business man [...] will sometimes pay a tenner rather than have his place taken apart.
[US]W.R. Burnett Asphalt Jungle in Four Novels (1984) 157: I’d take you apart if you were a foot taller.
[UK]N. Cohn Awopbop. (1970) 25: Whenever he got pushed into fights by passing madmen, he’d invariably take them apart.
[US]G. Swarthout Skeletons 149: I ought to take you apart.
[UK]F. Taylor Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 315: And afterwards take you apart.
[US]D. Hecht Skull Session 480: Come on. Try me, try to take me apart. Only this time you’ll be up against one of your own kind.

2. to reprimand someone.

[US]M. Spillane Long Wait (1954) 39: Nobody’s taking me apart, especially you.
take the biscuit (v.)

see separate entry.

take the bun (v.)

see separate entry.

take the burnt chops (v.) [the campfire meals musterers eat]

(N.Z.) to take up work as a musterer or drover.

[NZ] (ref. to 1890–1910) L.G.D. Acland Early Canterbury Runs (1951) 366: Burnt chops – An expression somewhat akin to the expression ‘Burnt Spur’, which denoted the business of a high country mustering : ‘So-and-so has taken to the b.s.’, meaning he has taken on mustering.
[Aus]Baker N.Z. Sl.
take the cake (v.)

see separate entry.

take the cure (v.) [SE take the cure, to withdraw from alcohol/drug addiction]

(US) to give up something or refrain from doing something.

[US]R. Prather Scrambled Yeggs 73: It looks like he takes the cure a few months back; he gets in so deep Drag cuts him off.
[US]Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
take the dairy (off) (v.) [corruption of SE direction, i.e. redirect attention]

to divert suspicion.

[US](con. 1910s) D. Mackenzie Hell’s Kitchen 101: They are ready to give information about others in order to ‘take the dairy’ (divert suspicion) from themselves.
[Ire]J. Phelan Tramp at Anchor 36: I did not even know how to ‘take the dairy’ — that is, to behave suspiciously, drawing a warder’s attention, while a friend did something prohibited.
[UK]Guardian 28 Aug. 7: It seemed to me that certain villains were using my name to take the dairy (blame) off themselves.
take the electric cure (v.)

(US prison/Und.) to be executed in the electric chair.

[US]C.G. Givens ‘Chatter of Guns’ in Sat. Eve. Post 13 Apr.; list extracted in AS VI:2 (1930) 134: take the electric cure, v.phr. Be electrocuted.
take the mickey (out of) (v.)

see separate entry.

take the oath (v.)

to have a drink.

[UK]G.A. Sala America Revisited I 68: ‘Taking the oath’ meant, when you paid a visit to a friend’s house accidentally finding a bottle of Bourbon whiskey and a pitcher of iced water in the recesses of a bookcase [...] and straight away swearing fealty to the Republic by ‘liquoring up.’.
take the scenic route (v.) (orig. US teen)

1. to concentrate on pleasure at the expense of efficiency or speed.

[US]G. Sculatti Catalog of Cool 🌐 (to) take the scenic route (verb): To perform a task with an eye toward enjoyment rather than efficiency.

2. to do things ‘the hard way’.

[US]L. Bing Do or Die (1992) 9: You can take the freeway out of here by sticking with the rules. Or you can do it your way and take the scenic route.
take the veil (v.)

(US gay) to abandon the homosexual lifestyle.

[US]Goldin et al. DAUL 219/1: Take the veil. To discontinue passive sodomous practices.
[US]Guild Dict. Homosexual Terms 48: veil, to take the (v.): Used to denote actions Intending to take the individual away from the homosexual environment, and, presumably, cause him to abandon a former homosexual life; the more common avenues being getting married, entering a monastic order, etc.
[US]B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular.
[US] (ref. to 1945) in Walking After Midnight (1989) 49: If you admitted being homosexual in those days you were automatically released from the army. We called it ‘taking the veil,’ so I took the veil quite early.
take to the fair (v.) [the excitements of a fair]

(Irish) to amaze, to astonish; thus take things to the fair, to exaggerate.

[Ire]‘Myles na gCopaleen’ Best of Myles (1968) 55: But I’ll tell you what takes me to the fair. Your men above in the park. The fellas that’s tryin to hunt the deer into a cage.
[Ire]F. O’Connor Traveller’s Samples 66: ‘You take things to the fair, Dan,’ I said to him once. ‘All I ask [...] is that bloody idiots will keep their opinions to themselves.’.
[Ire]P. Boyle At Night All Cats are Grey 188: ‘What would take you to the fair,’ he said, ‘is the way a decent modest girl could make such a disgrace of herself.’.
what it takes (n.) [the centrality of money to daily life]

(orig. US) money.

[US]M. Prenner ‘Sl. Terms for Money’ in AS IV:5 357: To avoid using the word money, the well-informed user of slang may use [...] what it takes.
[US]‘Mae West in “The Hip Flipper”’ [comic strip] in B. Adelman Tijuana Bibles (1997) 100: [He] took Lotta down to his bank and counted out plenty of what it takes.
[US]C. Sandburg People, Yes 165: The what-it-takes, a roll, a wad.

In exclamations

take it!

(gay) an excl. used by one demanding fellatio.

[US]G. Legman ‘Lang. of Homosexuality’ Appendix VII in Henry Sex Variants.
[US]J. Rechy Numbers (1968) 206: ‘Take it!’ Johnny says urgently [...] the tall man takes Johnny’s cum in his mouth.