pie n.
1. in sexual contexts, like the foodstuff as ‘sweet’ and ‘good enough to eat’.
(a) (orig. US, also pye-corner) the vagina.
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | A Merry Play in Farmer (1905) 86: But how say you, Sir John, was it good, your pie? | |
| Blind Beggar of Bednall-Green Act IV: You shall likewise see the amorous conceits and Love songs betwixt Captain Pod of Py-corner, and Mrs. Rump of Ram-alley. | |
| Your Five Gallants I i: As in one pie twenty may dip their sippits, so vpon one woman forty may consume their pattrimonies. | |
| Custom of the Country I i: A Surgeon [...] an excellent dissector, One that has cut up more young tender Lamb-pies. | |
| Rule a Wife II i: There was no wisdom in’t, to bid an Artist, An old seducer to a femal banquet, I can cut up my pye without your instructions. | |
 | Wits Recreations verse 310: She’s mine quoth th’other by Pye-corner law: / Where sticking once a pricke on what you buy / It’s then your owne, which no man must deny. | |
| Dozen of Drunkards 14: [Lusty Lawrence will] breake up every Bride Pie, ere it be well bak’d by Hymen. | |
| Laughing Mercury 25 Aug. - 8 Sept. 173: There is a Pye-Corner Cook this week to be roasted on a Butchers-prick in Smithfield-Round and after to be basted to death with Pig-sauce. | |
| Strange Newes 2: Peg. I meet with merry Hectors [...] they give me Pye-corner Law and Pye-corner Pay, and I am contented to the life. | |
| ‘The Rebells Reign’ in Rump Poems and Songs (1662) i 316: Martin and St. Johns [...] had each a finger i’th’ pye: Some for the Money, and some for the Conny. | |
| Caius Marius III 162: A Spark ... wou’d fane have a finger in the py ... but she, good soul, had as lieve hear of a Toad. | |
| Fifteen Real Comforts of Matrimony 39: One smooth Chinn’d Slipstring or other [...] makes a Pye-Corner Ensurance of his Affection upon her Belly. | |
| ‘Wenching Tanner’ in Pepys Ballads (1987) V 252: His finger straight was in the Pye. | |
| Married Beau II i: A sluttish Wench with a Dirt Pie. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | in Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (1992) I 411: ‘Hole in the pie, hole in the puddin’, / Hole in the gal they call Sally Goodin.’ [...] Learned near Pineville, Missouri, about 1880. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Love me Sailor 21: The old man can [...] go below whenever he feels like a bit of passenger pie. | |
| Summer Glare 198: ‘I’ve got a strong suspicion [...] Stuart has a finger in the pie.’ ‘Which pie?’ Nell asked. ‘In Nancy’s pie of course.’. | |
| ‘Coming Down Again’ [lyrics] Slip my tongue in somone else’s pie. | |
| Filth 244: Let’s take a look at former W.P.C. Fulton’s hairy pie! | |
| Pound for Pound 277: Chicky continued to sleep alone. No pie, no poon. | |
| Running the Books 82: I’d kick myself in the ass, ass backwardz if I didn’t attempt to get the goodz, knowin’ that I wanted a piece of the pie. |
(b) a woman.
| [ | | Cocke Lorelles Bote Biii: That is colfys doughter the drunken koke A lusty pye basket]. |
| Interlude of Youth line 411: A little pretty nisot, Ye be well nice, God wot Ye be a little pretty pie. | |
| Iron Chest I ii: Peace, you pie! an you prate thus I’ll stop your mouth. |
(c) a term of affection.
| Why Are We in Vietnam? (1970) 16: Tell me why, pie. |
(d) (US campus) an attractive, sexually desirable woman; also used derog.
| Rock 44: ‘How’d you like Thelma?’ ‘That pie was too easy.’. | |
| Current Sl. I:4 2/1: Pie, n. ‘Typical’ college girl, bouffant hairdo, too much make-up. | |
| ‘Razorback Sl.’ in AS L:1/2 63: I’ve got to get me some pie for the weekend. | |
| Brown’s Requiem 92: A profound piece of passion pie one moment, a wilful shrew the next. What a body! |
2. in sense of a ‘pie’ that can be cut up or distributed.
(a) political or other patronage or favours.
| Daily Tel. 26 Dec. n.p.: Men may come and men may go; the Grant ‘Boom’ may be succeeded by the Sherman ‘Boom;’ but Pie goes on for ever [DA]. | |
| in N.Y. Press Nov. in Stallman (1966) 105: Strong’s [i.e. mayor of NYC] got a regular pie. | |
| N.Y. Times 15 Dec. 3: When his constituents asked him why he could not secure more routes [for postal free delivery] the only reply he could make was that he could not get up to the ‘pie counter’ [DA]. | |
| N.Y. Times 12 May n.p.: Take your tribute but buy national defense with it, don’t waste it in ‘pork’ and ‘pie’ and Populist lunacies! [DA]. | |
| Price of Murder (1978) 180: He got it hauled free by giving the trucker a piece of the pie. |
(b) (orig. US) a treat, a bribe, something highly desirable.
| Bulletin (Sydney) 7 Mar. 7/3: Those most valiant and efficient protectors of the peace, and pies (especially pies), Constables Delap and Bennet, who made the clever arrest, testified that the crib had been cracked in a masterful way. | |
| N.Y. Mercury 3 Jan. in (1909) 196/1: At the depot the light was dim, and so it was in the sleeper, as it generally is; but as she got into the car a neat leg in a white stocking showed plainly enough to make Jim murmur to himself, ‘Well, this is pie.’. | |
| Confessions of Convict 143: None but moneyed swells are her pie. |
(c) money.
| Boss 175: It’ ag’inst my religion to let anybody grab off a bigger piece of pie than I do when him an’ me is pals. | |
| Sporting Times 15 Apr. 2/3: The old man moseys west’ard with the sickenin’ feelin’ that he’s goin’ to be pie to a member o’ the class that wouldn’t look at him if it wasn’t paid to. | |
| Young People’s Pride 14: All you have to do is sell your serial rights. After that – pie. | |
| Lead With Your Left (1958) 27: Started to cut into the big pie but got himself killed. | |
| Indep. on Sun. Culture 21 May 12: As the film’s Nick the Greek might have said, that’s a lot of pie. |
3. (orig. US) that which is easy or enjoyable.
(a) anything easy or simple [pie adj.1 ].
| They Die with Their Boots Clean 116: It’s a bit of cush. It’s a slice of pie. | |
| Savage Night (1991) 50: It was too much pie. | |
| et al. CUSS 170: Pie Easy course. |
(b) in fig. uses whereby the pie intensifies a given adj.; usu. in phr. ...as pie.
| (con. c.1840) Huckleberry Finn 28: You fetch them to the cave, and you’re always as polite as pie to them. | |
| ‘’Arry on Harry’ in Punch 24 Aug. 90/2: Yer grammar may be quite O K, / All yer parts o’ speech proper as pie. | |
| ‘The City of Dreadful Thirst’ in Rio Grande’s Last Race (1904) 31: And, once outside the cloud of thirst, we felt as right as pie. | |
| Whores for Gloria 69: He would be as healthy as pie. |
4. (US black/drugs) 1kg of cocaine [the dealer will most likely ‘slice it up’ into smaller weights].
| ‘Ebonics’ [lyrics] Yo, pay attention / And listen real closely how I break this slang shit down / A ki of coke is a pie. | |
| Ebonics Primer at www.dolemite.com [Internet] pie Definition: one kilo of coke. Example: Yo I gota go uptown to pick up this pie. | |
| ‘Me OK’ [lyrics] ‘Trap or die’, that’s me OK? / Mister Whip-a-knot-and-get-a-half-a-pie, that’s me, OK? |
5. see pie-can
In compounds
see separate entry.
a prostitute.
| Mercurius Fumigosus 11 9 Aug. 102: ’Tis thought, the next year wee shall have a crop of Young Pistolls, if the Py-woman do but water them Night and Morning. | |
| Mercurius Fumigosus 19 4–11 Oct. 168: Build a row of Almshouses for decayed Py-men, or Py-Women, alleadging the Great Charter granted to the Py-Women in the City of Venice, where the Curtezans live after a more hospitable and gentile manner than the Py-Women of this Countrey. |
SE in slang uses
In compounds
1. a fool, a simpleton.
| Sporting Times 4 Mar. 2/4: Mighty anxious to bring the piecan down, ’Ector led his fifth card. | |
| ‘The Lure of the Lucre’ Sporting Times 1 Aug. 1/4: It ne’er struck me for a mo’ that she’d pal on to any ‘pie’ / Who’d be comin’ into money after Christmas. | |
| ‘Poetry in Prosaic Places’ Sporting Times 19 Feb. 3/2: Then left him like a ‘pie,’ / Waiting patiently for them to bring it back. [Ibid.] 5 Mar. 1/4: As far as I can size it up, she is no piecan, / It’s the dude who gives her presents who’s the Jay. | |
| Limehouse Nights 269: Yer plurry pie-cans! | |
| More Educated Evans (1932) 35: That piecan! Why, he don’t know a horse from a step-ladder. | |
| None But the Lonely Heart 266: ‘Listen piecan,’ she says. |
2. a second-rate object.
| Good Companions 526: You never saw such a piecan of a circus. |
1. a union-card, esp. when used as a credential for begging; thus pie-card artist, a union member.
| Arizona Champion (Mohave Co., AZ) 27 Apr. 3/4: Each and every one of us do hereby pledge ourselves not to play for more than seven dollars, the price of a ‘pie-card’. | |
| McCook Tribune (NE) 30 Aug. n.p.: No engineer or condictor has a full complement of tools, etc. upon his engine or caboose without the tribune. It is as important as a ‘Pie-card,’ boys. | |
| Voice of the People (N.O.) 14 Aug. 4/4: As a result of those Barbers striking like the I.W.W. a great many pie-card artists lost their pier. | |
| Voice of the People (N.O.) 18 June 2/1: Graft unionism means: Greed, jurisdictional wars, hatred, competition and pie-card parasites. | |
| Day Book (Chicago) 31 Mar. 23/1: A political ballot-box Socialist pie-card artist idea. | |
| ‘Vocab. of Bums’ in AS IV:5 343: Pie card—A union card used to obtain food or lodging. |
2. a ticket that entitles one to a meal from a pie card mission.
| Bisbee Dly Rev. (AZ) 15 June 4/4: He ate on the pie card long enough to think out a better scheme. | |
| Albuquerque Citizen (NM) 2 May 6/3: getting together some funds with which to buy pie cards for some hungry baseball players who are hanging around looking for a job. | |
| Bisbee Dly Rev. (AZ) 13 may 5/5: Several of them have thus far failed to land positions and are hurting for a pie card. | |
| Labor Jrnl (Everett, WA) 28 Oct. 1/1: To build up the ‘pie card’ fund ‘Paddy’ arranged with a carnival company to stage a show. | |
| ‘Jargon of the Und.’ in DN V 458: Pie card mission, One in which the ‘saved’ are given free meal tickets. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 176: pie-card mission A mision that issues free meal tickets. |
3. one who begs for a meal.
| Milk and Honey Route 211: Pie card – One who hangs around and lives on a remittance man or some other person with money. |
4. the holder of a union-card.
| Brownstone 131: ‘Don’t let that pie-card pick on you, Joe?’ advised the ex-seaman. |
(US black) the mouth.
| Jives of Dr. Hepcat (1989) 9: Hold your piechopper, don’t vip another vop or I’ll take my headache stick and massage your top. |
1. an insignificant person.
| ‘Barracking’ in Benno and Some of the Push 144: He was that angry with the South pie-biters. | |
| (con. 1892) T.A. Dorgan in TAD Lex. (1993) 63: They all say I’m a dude, a pie eater. | |
| Dinkum Aussie Dict. 40: Pie eater: A person of no consequence. |
2. one who is greedy for material possessions.
| Caldwell Trib. (ID) 11 July 2/1: Judge Sweet refers to political pie-eaters with a commendable show of contempt. | |
| Bulletin (Sydney) 22 Dec. 11/1: Again the Salvation Army fights the relatives of the late lamented at law for the cash. [...] The Army is beginning to build up an odorous reputation as a hungry, earth-grabbing organisation and a great ecclesiastical pie-biter. |
3. a fool, a simpleton; thus pie-eating adj.
| Virginian 128: He asked his Monte horse a question. ‘Do yu’ reckon she’ll have forgotten you too, you pie-biter?’. | |
| Christ in Concrete 273: What says the pie-eating coffee-drinking A-merde-can signore the President? | |
| Four-Legged Lottery 176: He [...] now works for the bookies to get the mugs in. The pie-eaters. | |
| The Roy Murphy Show (1973) 110: This piddling, puerile, pusillanimous, pen-pushing, pie-eating Pariah. | |
| Aussie Swearers Guide 47: To a visitor or newcome to Australia it may seem strange that pie-eater is a term of opprobrium. | |
| Dinkum Aussie Dict. 40: Pie eater: [...] A dickhead. |
4. a small-time criminal.
| Joyful Condemned 166: ‘Just a pie-eater,’ he added with a sneer, ‘a dirty pie-eater.’. | |
| Lowspeak. |
1. drunk.
| Breaking Into Society (1904) 179: He would [...] continue to hoist until he was Pie-eyed. | |
| Rules of the Game 102: ‘Drunk, eh?’ ‘Spifflicated, pie-eyed, loaded, sloshed.’. | |
| St Louis Post-Despatch 16 Jan. 25/2: You’re slopping up too much scat (whiskey). You get so pie-eyed that you can’t tell a crib from a britch (pocket). | |
| Rampant Age 271: You were so pie-eyed you couldn’t even—. | |
| Right Ho, Jeeves 178: If you want real oratory, the preliminary noggin is essential. Unless pie-eyed, you cannot hope to grip. | |
| Iceman Cometh Act IV: Why the hell don’t you get pie-eyed and celebrate? | |
| Boss of Britain’s Underworld 203: The team showed the usual reaction [...] by going ashore and getting pie-eyed on the booze. | |
| Scrambled Yeggs 39: Dreamy-eyed couples swirled around on the tiny dance floor; also couples not so dreamy-eyed, but just plain pie-eyed. | |
| Texas by the Tail (1994) 56: Get yourself pie-eyed, and it won’t cost you a penny. | |
| Balloons in Black Bag 155: ‘Huh!’ ‘Huh won’t help you when eighteen pie-eyed Lancers come dancing through the door looking for naughty girls.’. | |
| Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 222: I don’t want you getting too pie-eyed before. | |
| Eve. Standard 28 May 11: I was pie-eyed the other day and stopped for chips. | |
| Indep. Rev. 4 Jan. 4: Most of Britain was too pie-eyed [...] to notice. | |
| Assassination of Thatcher 222: Patriotism was only an excuse to get what they called pie-eyed. |
2. exhausted.
| Roman Hat Mystery 180: The Medical Examiner [...] thought I was pie-eyed from over-work. |
3. astonished, amazed.
| (con. WWI) Squad 222: You might just as well scare a guy to death as kill him, an’ scare ’im pie-eyed’s what the shells do... | |
| Farewell, My Lovely (1949) 189: Randall was pie-eyed. His mouth moved, but nothing came out of it. | |
| Cutty one Rock (2005) 166: The greasers took in this spectacle, pie-eyed and with some concern. |
4. under the influence of drugs.
| Fixx 205: Three pie-eyed lovers on a king-size bed in Maida Vale. | |
| Kill Your Darlings 277: Staggering around pie-eyed with a fat joint in his hand. |
see floater n.1 (1d)
(US teen) the mouth.
| Christine 63: Then shut your pie-hole. | |
| Online Sl. Dict. [Internet] pie hole n 1. mouth. (‘Shut your pie hole!’). | |
| Nature Girl 164: Genie, shut your piehole. | |
| This Is How You Lose Her 93: [He] popped said fool in the piehole with a weak overhand right. | |
| OG Dad 167: The green plastic hippo she picked off the bus seat and jammed in her piehole. |
(US campus) to become drunk.
| Campus Sl. Nov. 4: pie out – to slowly become more sleepy or more drunk. | |
| Sl. and Sociability 30: In college slang out is the most productive particle: [...] pie out ‘become drunk’. |
a dog.
| Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era. |
1. (US) a police van, used to transport villains.
| Life In Sing Sing 257: Pie Wagon. Patrol wagon. | |
| Wash. Post 3 July 3/1: They waltzed him over to the Irish clubhouse and then gave him a ride in the pie wagon ter the Tombs. | |
| Keys to Crookdom 413: Pie wagon. Patrol wagon. | |
| Und. and Prison Sl. | |
| Amboy Dukes 111: He was riding in the pie wagon while Frank was out somewhere [...] with a babe. | |
| (con. 1910s) Hoods (1953) 16: The clanging pie wagon finally came along, the cops in their high, stiff helmets. | |
| (con. 1940s) Hold Tight (1990) 196: Anyone still in drag was immediately led off to the pie wagon. |
2. a prison.
| Sun (NY) 19 Aug. 2/4: [graffito in Sing Sing Prison] Jack the Ripper, 6 months in a pie wagon, and Jimmie the Lush, 3 months in a brewery. | |
| Denton (MD) Journal 24 Oct. 1/7: Slang of the Sailor ‘Oh, he’s nothing but a beach comber. He was run up for breaking it once and got sent to the pie wagon,’ [...] The ‘pie wagon’ is the place where they put prisoners. | |
| St Helens Mist (OR) 11 May5/3: Pie wagon — The brig (prison). |
3. (US) a wagon used as sleeping quarters for chaingang workers.
| (con. 1922) I Am a Fugitive 64: Twelve men slept in a ‘pie wagon’ (a steel-barred wagon on wheels, four tiers of three bunks each). |
In phrases
(Aus.) total pleasure or enjoyment; usu. in negative.
| Bulletin (Sydney) 18 Aug. 22/3: Touring in this land of big spaces is not all pie and velvet, and the protesting lady has given a good imitation of Patrick’s pig on a string. |
energetically, vigorously.
| Eng. Humorists 148: She loved Tom ‘like pie’. | |
| ‘’Arry on the Road’ in Punch 9 Aug. 83/1: I ’ad the box seat, mate, oh, trust me! I squared that like pie with our Whip. |
(orig. US) fantasies, fond hopes and illusions; also as attrib. adj.
| ‘The Preacher and the Slave’ in et al. Songs of the Amer. West (1968) 544: You will eat bye and bye / In that glorious land above the sky; / Work and pray, live on hay, / You’ll get pie in the sky when you die. | |
| N.Y. Tribune 12 June 55/1: Over here they believe in pie in the sky when you die, and all that sort of thing. | |
| ‘Pie in the Sky’ in Hobo’s Hornbook 83: Work and pray, live on hay, / You’ll get pie in the sky when you die. (that’s no lie!). | |
| (con. 1920s) Judgement Day in Studs Lonigan (1936) 822: You’ll have pie in the sky when you die (It’s a lie). | |
| Aberdeen Jrnl 2 Oct. 2/2: Squirrel pie may remain pie in the sky. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | |
| Hamlet of Stepney Green Act I: No more pie in the sky. You’ve got to support your mother now. | |
| Rationale of the Dirty Joke (1972) I 82: The pie-in-the-sky heaven that the climbing boy goes to. | |
| Jones Men 87: Most of the time it’s just been a lotta pie-in-the-sky crap. | |
| (con. 1920s) Tea at Miss Cranston’s (1991) 11: It was aye a pipe-dream that we would were to get a big house some day [...] Pie in the sky! | |
| Indep. 11 Sept. 1: How raising the wheel became pie in the sky. | |
| Hooky Gear 268: Back when he first say it it was pie in the sky. |