Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. Aus.) one who is categorized as a sexual pervert, esp. a child-molester; also in joc. + attrib. use.

1948		S.L. Elliott Rusty Bugles I i: You little perv, you. [Ibid.] II iii: Who’s a dirty perv, you dirty perv.
1949		R. Park Poor Man’s Orange 38: ‘Just look at that dirty ole secko, will you?’ he said disgustedly, and scooping up a stone he ran after it, yelling, ‘Merv, Merv, the rotten old perv.’.
1959		D. Niland Big Smoke 151: Some perv had his hand up your rompers.
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 63: Hanging’s too good for perves like him.
1965		L. Haylen Big Red 79: I shouldn’t wonder if he isn’t a bit of an old perv!
1979		Lette & Carey Puberty Blues 51: Oh the old perv. Bishop can stick it.
1985		R.G. Barrett You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 41: There hasn’t been a decent rape, bank robbery or murder for weeks. Even the kiddy pervs have gone quiet.
1989		T. Blacker Fixx 39: My nanny’s a perv. She makes me give her climaxes.
1992		R.G. Barrett White Shoes 247: Going through a woman’s underwear behind her back. I always knew I was some sort of perv.
1995		C. Hiaasen Stormy Weather 294: Tony, you dirty old perv.
1998		I. Welsh Filth 130: This cunt must be a fuckin perve of the highest order.
2003		in ‘Ben Trovato’ On the Run (2007) 60: They were giving me the glad eye and ignoring Uncle Pervy who had been sent along as chaperone.
2004		R.G. Barrett Rosa Marie’s Baby (2013) [ebook] The fat perv in the round glasses and beret.
2005		H. Mantel Beyond Black 133: He started pulling my skirt up [...] I was crying and swearing and shouting ‘Piss off, you perv’.
2014		me-stepmums-too-fuckin-hot-mate at www.fakku.net 🌐 Typical Kyo-Kun, such a perv.
2016		A. Wheatle Crongton Knights 29: She’s not even supposed to have a boyfriend, let alone an eighteen-year-old perv.
2019		S.M. Jones Lives Laid Away [ebook] ‘Just wanted to see if you were some kind of perv’.
2019		C. Hammer Silver [ebook] I was naked when the old man arrived. [...] He was practically salivating, the old perve.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 17: I pounded a perv who whipped out his wang.
2023		J. Ellroy (con. 1962) Enchanters 7: His perv sheet dates back to 1938/ He’s a stat rape-o and psycho snout diver.
2024		J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 125: ‘Down boy. You really are such a fruity old perv’.

2. a male homosexual.

1964		B. Hesling Dinkumization or Depommification 116: Two cops [...] booked nearly two hundred ‘pervs’ a year from this one dunny.
1973		(con. 1940s–60s) Hogbotel & ffuckes ‘The New People’s Flag’ in Snatches and Lays 51: I’ll pimp for prosses, pimps and pervs.
1981		S. Berkoff Decadence in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 13: You digust me / you perve / dirty little homo.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 433: Married johns and pervs and queers are prone to it.

3. pornography, usu. featuring what is considered ‘bizarre’ sex.

1942		‘Havildar’ Hava look: Mag. H.M.A.T. ‘Havildar’ 14 Mar. 1: ‘Logical Love’ [...] by that well-known perv-merchant, John [...] Hunt [OED].
1997		(con. 1960s) A. Frewin London Blues 69: perv is girls dressed in rubber and tied up, or a white girl being screwed by a black guy.
2020		Wickstead Soho Typescripts: 16: When he inquired of a Soho bookseller whether he had any books and pictures other than flagellation he was told: ‘You can’t sell these rotten buggers any of that normal perv!’.

4. (Aus.) a general term of abuse.

1968

(con. 1940s) G. Dutton Andy 148: You always were a bloody perv.

5. (also pervdog) a voyeur; also non-sexual use.

1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 44: I feel a bit of a perve standing here like this but I can’t help getting an earful of them two lovebirds.
1979		D. Maitland Breaking Out 158: You’re just a couple of dirty pervs!
1993		K. Lette Foetal Attraction (1994) 227: You’re just a glorified perv. All you do is film animals sleeping with or eating each other.
2001		Indep. Rev. 23 Feb. 9: I just mumbled, ‘Yeah, I’m an old perve’, [...] and made a hasty exit.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 155: perv/perve/pervy Lustful staring or the person who does so.
2013		J. Stahl Happy Mutant Baby Pills 61: I hovered, like some lind of zoner perv.
2023		(con. 1962) J. Ellroy Enchanters 36: Pervdog, voyeur, peeper.

6. the male act of watching passing women; similarly looking at pornographic or sexy pictures.

1986		R.G. Barrett Real Thing 45: A bit of a perv on the office girls in town for a while.
1986		R. Beckett Dinkum Aussie Dict. 40: Perve: In its most general sense the male habit of eyeing up a woman.
1996		(con. 1964-65) B. Thorpe Sex and Thugs and Rock ’n’ Roll 68: ‘Are you having a good enough perve you dirty old bastard’.
2000		R.G. Barrett Leaving Bondi (2013) [ebook] Ray also had a good-looking French girlfriend who was always good for a perv.
2003		see sense 5.
2004		L. Redhead Peepshow [ebook] Everyone else in the place looked over, copping a free perve.
2005		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper 4 144: Every sex maniac and rapist in jail would call in for a daily perve.
2011		J.J. Connolly Viva La Madness 169: I sit down and click on the first photo [...] Sonny thinks I’m just having a perv.

7. any form of ‘deviant’ sex act.

1992

B. Gifford Night People 26: The john had paid Cutie a hundred dollars for letting him piss on her hair. Ordinarily she didn’t do perv.

8. in non-sexual use, an obsessive.

1983		J. Byrell (con. 1959) Up the Cross 155: Any cue game perv knows that [...] you [...] select your own personal cue.
1985		R.G. Barrett You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 96: Seeing as how you’re an opal perv, Price, I thought I might have a word with you about them.
1998		R.G. Barrett Mud Crab Boogie (2013) [ebook] If you were a people perv it [i.e. a nightclub] was paradise; providing you kept your mouth shut and didn’t make too much eye contact.