bird n.4
1. a prison sentence; do bird, serve a sentence; throw bird, imprison.
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Room 90: He’s just out of ‘bird’ – that’s jail. | |
| They Drive by Night 14: If you’d never done a bit of bird you didn’t know what it was like when they topped a guy. | |
| Sharpe of the Flying Squad 329: birdlime : Time (in prison). Of an old convict the Underworld would say : ‘He has done plenty of bird’; the ‘lime’ part is usually left out. | |
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | (con. 1940s) Borstal Boy 147: We might [...] do our bird together. | |
| in Sun. Graphic 20 July in Norman’s London (1969) 17: It didn’t make a lot of difference whether or not I had done what I got nicked for, because I still got bird for it. | |
| Crust on its Uppers 20: Me not having done any bird. | |
| ‘Prisoner and Escort’ Porridge [TV script] flet.: What’s it like, this nick? barrowcl.: Oh very good [...] flet.: Oh yeah. Bird’s bird though in’ it? | |
| ‘Prison Language’ in Michaels & Ricks (1980) 525: One may speak of [...] bird (rhyming slang bird lime = time). | |
![[NZ]](/static/img/flags/nz.png "New Zealand") | Big Huey 145: So I settled back to do my bird. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Doing Time 186: bird: prison, or a term in prison; for example, ‘doing bird’. | |
| West in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 92: Days and nights of doing bird and eating porridge within the flinty walls of Pentonville. | |
| Aus. Prison Sl. Gloss. 🌐 Bird. Prison or the sentence served therein. | |
| Guardian G2 17 Aug. 13: Bennett, who did two years’ bird for burglary. | |
| Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 18/1: bird n. 1 a prison sentence, time served in prison. | |
| (ref. to 1971) ‘Old Bailey’ Homeless in my Heart 179: Beginning to learn what is meant [...] By ‘bird’ or ‘a nice jam roll’. | |
| Crongton Knights 32: If they said I’d have to do a year’s bird I’d still do it. | |
 | ‘Call me a Spartan’ 🎵 Feds tryna move like zoos / Tryna throw a bird on my crew (on crew). |
2. previous convictions.
| Police Journal Oct. 501: This, with Jack’s previous convictions (bird), caused him to be sentenced...to five years’ penal servitude...at Parkhurst. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). |
3. in fig. use, any form of constraint, responsibility.
| (con. 1950s–60s) in Little Legs 91: They’ve got to do the bird, carry the weight, and change the nappies. |
In compounds
(UK prison) emotionally affected by a (long) prison sentence.
| Frying-Pan 42: I’m bird-happy, that’s my trouble. I’ve done too much of it. |
1. (US) a prison.
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). |
2. (US drugs) a place where one can purchase narcotics [puns on birdseye n. (3) + SE house].
| Narcotics Lingo and Lore. |
3. a psychiatric institution.
| Teen-Age Mafia 70: Things like this could send you to the birdhouse. |
In phrases
(UK prison) one’s first experience of a prison sentence.
| Lowspeak. |