Green’s Dictionary of Slang

an insignificant person, a ‘nobody’; thus drunk as a pissant, very drunk; game as a pissant, very brave.

1932		J.C. Rogers ‘South’ in Botkin Folk-Say 150: Drank about fifteen bottles [...] Got pie-yed as a p---ant.
1942		Davis & Wolsey Call House Madam (1943) 433: You son-of-a-pissant!
1952		(con. 1861-5) B.I. Wiley Life of Billy Yank 27: Solder: Leslie Nickname: Piss-ant Postion: Artist.
1953		J. Thompson Savage Night (1991) 7: You stupid pissant [...] What’s the idea?
1960		(con. 1940s) D. MacCuish Do Not Go Gentle (1962) 119: You friggin’ piss ants.
1976		P. Conroy Great Santini (1977) 309: You sorry damn pissant.
1982		R.M. Brown Southern Discomfort (1983) 28: What’s that pissant up to now?
1983		R. Aven-Bray Ridgey-Didge Oz Jack Lang 40: Pissant Small angry person.
1996		K. Lette Mad Cows 173: I’ll take you to court, you lily-livered piss ant.
2005		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper 4 2: He was barely five feet tall, and so the nickname Piss Ant was slightly unkind, but it fitted.
2012		Chicago Trib. ‘The Onion’ 1 Nov. TAB-5/2: Abnormally growing cells consistently make the ‘complete dick move’ of producing false-positive signals. Cancer cell mutate into even cockier pissants .
2018		C. Hammer Scrublands [ebook] [of one who cannot hold their drink] ‘He’d come in here for a drink on occasion. Could put it away, too. Not a pissant like you’.
2018		‘Aidan Truhen’ Price You Pay 242: Sean is the little pissant who for some ungodly reason hired the Seven Demons.
2021		T. Pluck Boy from County Hell 275: ‘That’s right piss-ants, I’m living proof this sumbitch can’t shoot for shit’.