Green’s Dictionary of Slang

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

1975

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.

(US Und.) to accept a bribe.

1928

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

see cut one’s lucky under cut v.²

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.

1933		‘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.
1938		G. Kersh Night and the City 258: The only thing to do is to take Fabian for what he’s worth.
1948		(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.
1953		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.
1963		J. Rechy City of Night 196: He took that auntie for every cent, then he threw him out.
1974		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.
1989		Tom Petty ‘Yer So Bad’ 🎵 My sister got lucky, / married a yuppie / Took him for all he was worth.
1995		C. Hiaasen Stormy Weather 33: ‘How big a piece, darling?’ ‘Whatever we could take you for.’.
2004		J. Ellroy ‘Jungletown Jihad’ in Destination: Morgue! (2004) 366: Her old man’s a macher at Paramount and we took her for forty K.

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

1995		Eble Campus Sl. Apr.
1998		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.’.
2002		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.’.

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

1834		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.
1842		Flash (NY) 23 June n.p.: brooklyn Wants to Know [...] whether those prostitutes have got it all. Do you take, Shorty.
1851		Manchester Spy (NH) 19 Apr. n.p.: Do you take, you suckers.

see also under relevant n. or adj.

1. to cause problems for, to interfere with.

1610		Jonson Alchemist IV vii: I must give way [...] But I’ll take / A course with you.
1688		T. Shadwell Squire of Alsatia III i: Rogues, I shall take a course with you.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew.

2. to follow closely.

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1196/2: mid-C17–early 19.

to have swift and spontaneous sexual intercourse, usu. when both parties are wholly or partially dressed.

c.1786		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions n.p.: Flourish to Take a Flourish, to Enjoy a Woman.
1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (3rd edn) n.p.: To take a flourish; to enjoy a woman in a hasty manner, to take a flyer.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

see under Tyburn n.

to be hanged.

1720		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.
1885		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.
1891		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.
1912		(con. 1788) E.B. Simpson Robert Louis Stevenson Originals 109: [Deacon Brodie] gaily said he was going to take a leap in the dark.

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

1972		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.
1981		A.K. Shulman On the Stroll 233: Take an application from anyone you can find, advised Sweet Rudy.

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

1950

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

to have sexual intercourse.

1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1980		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.

to have sexual intercourse.

1890–1904

Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

(US) to scold, to punish.

1984		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!’.
1996		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.
2009		L. Tye Satchel 187: The commissioner took the Dodgers’ Leo Durocher to the woodshed for embracing the signing of black players.

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

1881		G.A. Crofutt Guide to Colorado 63: The Spanish Peaks, too, took low.
1958		Hughes & Bontemps Book of Negro Folklore 488: take low : To be humiliated. Women love to see a man take low.
1968		N. Heard Howard Street 89: Few Streeters take low, especially with a woman around to witness it.
1971		D. Wells Night People 96: Don’t take low from no jive cop.
1980		(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.

to be imprisoned, to serve a sentence.

1823

‘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.

(Irish) to be convulsed with laughter.

1908

L. Doyle Ballygullion (1927) 24: Ye’d ha’ taken your end at her.

to leave alone, to avoid someone.

1938

D. Runyon ‘The Three Wise Guys’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 401: Miss Clarabelle Cobb takes plenty of outdoors on Blondy Swanson.

(US prison) to attack in a group.

1950

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.

(Aus. und.) to run off.

1909

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.

1. to beat severely.

1902		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.
1915		Van Loan ‘Sporting Doctor’ in Taking the Count 57: We’re going to take that guy apart a joint at a time.
1937		F.C. Painton ‘The Devil Must Pay’ in Goodstone Pulps (1970) 18/2: If I really start on you, I’ll take you apart.
1946		S. Jackson An Indiscreet Guide to Soho 118: A business man [...] will sometimes pay a tenner rather than have his place taken apart.
1949		W.R. Burnett Asphalt Jungle in Four Novels (1984) 157: I’d take you apart if you were a foot taller.
1969		N. Cohn Awopbop. (1970) 25: Whenever he got pushed into fights by passing madmen, he’d invariably take them apart.
1979		G. Swarthout Skeletons 149: I ought to take you apart.
1986		F. Taylor Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 315: And afterwards take you apart.
1998		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.

1951

M. Spillane Long Wait (1954) 39: Nobody’s taking me apart, especially you.

(Aus.) to silence someone, to leave someone ‘at a loss for words’.

1941

Baker Popular Dict. Aus. Sl.

(gay) to fondle someone’s genitals.

1972

B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular.

see separate entry.

see separate entry.

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

1933		(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.
1941		Baker N.Z. Sl.

see separate entry.

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

1958		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.
1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.

to divert suspicion.

1930		(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.
1954		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.
2004		Guardian 28 Aug. 7: It seemed to me that certain villains were using my name to take the dairy (blame) off themselves.

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

1929

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.

see extract the Michael v.

see separate entry.

to have a drink.

1882

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.’.

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

1982–2004

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’.

1991

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.

(US gay) to abandon the homosexual lifestyle.

1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 219/1: Take the veil. To discontinue passive sodomous practices.
1965		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.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular.
1985		(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.

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

c.1940–5		‘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.
1951		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.’.
1966		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.’.

(orig. US) money.

1929		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.
c.1935		‘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.
1936		C. Sandburg People, Yes 165: The what-it-takes, a roll, a wad.

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

1941		G. Legman ‘Lang. of Homosexuality’ Appendix VII in Henry Sex Variants.
1967		J. Rechy Numbers (1968) 206: ‘Take it!’ Johnny says urgently [...] the tall man takes Johnny’s cum in his mouth.