Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a Dutch person.

1652		Laughing Mercury 15-22 Sept. 185: How now my Dutch Mullipuffs, my fat Boares in doublets, What price Herrings in Holland now? Have ye not fish’d fair and caught a frogg?
1798		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘Tales of Hoy’ Works (1801) V 238: And the Dutchman, a Frog in the Days of Queen Bess.

2. (also Bullfrog) a French person.

[1654		W. Prynne Quakers Unmasked [title] The Quakers Unmasked, And clearly detected to be but the Spawn of Romish Frogs, Jesuites, and Franciscan Freers; sent from Rome to seduce the intoxicated Giddy-headed English Nation].
1657		W. D’Avenant First Days Entertainm. Rutland-House 55: Your Kitchins are well lin'd with Beef; [...] whilst those in the Continent [...] entertain flesh as a Regalio; and we, your poor French Frogs, are fain to sing to a Salade.
1778		F. Burney Evelina (1861) 48: Hark you, Mrs. Frog [...] you may lie in the mud till some of your Monsieurs come to help you out of it.
[1780		M.P. Andrews Fire and Water! (1790) 31: This is the Marchioness de Grenouille [...].].
1788		J. O’Keeffe Prisoner at Large 12: Now, Mademoiselle, am I like dat Jacky de Frog?
1803		in J. Ashton Eng. Caricature and Satire on Napoleon (1884) I 175: John Bull uplifts his cudgel, and his bulldog growls. Says the old man, ‘Hark ye, Mr. Frog!’.
c.1813		‘Wellington’s Victory’ in Wellington’s Laurels 2: And oft the French frogs cry’d marbiau / They got such a D---able thrashing.
1827		‘An Officer of the Line’ Military Sketch-book I June c.207: The French might fairly exclaim with the frogs in the fable — ‘Ah! Monsieur Bull, what is sport to you is death to us’.
1831		‘Gallery of 140 Comicalities’ Bell’s Life in London 24 June 2/3: Shiver my timbers, Mounseer Frog [...] There’s nothing like a can of grog.
1838		T. Haliburton Clockmaker II 150: Mount Shear Bullfrog gave the case in our favour in two two’s.
1849		Thackeray Pendennis I 231: [They] began laughing, jeering, hooting, and calling opprobrious names at the Frenchman. Some cried out ‘Frenchy! Frenchy!’ some exclaimed ‘Frogs!’.
1853		T. Haliburton Sam Slick’s Wise Saws I 43: You have heard of John Bull, it is the gineral name of the English, as ‘Frog’ is of the French.
1879		‘’Arry in Parry’ in Punch 15 Nov. 217/1: I thought I’d trot over to Parry, and see wot the frogs was about.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 28 Feb. 7/3: We can’t go and bring our lads home if any European power chips in. ’Twould be the same as saying, ‘I won’t fight your Frogs or Sour-krauts, as they’re armed as well as I.’.
1889		‘’Arry in Switzerland’ in Punch 5 Dec. in P. Marks (2006) 98: It’s honly hus English can ride. Frogs ain’t in it ah shovel, you know.
1892		in Punch 15 Oct. 170: [heading] A FROG HE WOULD A-ROWING GO! [...] (With Mr. Punch’s cordial Compliments to the victorious French Eight.).
1895		Truth (Sydney) 13 Jan. 1/3: The writer of the burlesque appears [...] to have [...] outcroaked the Facetious Frog .
1910		B. Fisher Mutt & Jeff 31 Jan. [synd. cartoon] Say, you big frog, I never won a fight in my life.
1917		J.E. Rendinell diary 20 Nov. in One Man’s War (1928) 37: The boys got on a little dinky street car. A frog was motorman and conductor too.
1921		H.C. Witwer Leather Pushers 174: Would I be liable to lay down to the Frog with a crack at the world’s title in sight?
1932		(con. 1919) Dos Passos Nineteen Nineteen in USA (1966) 527: A lot of latrine talk about the frogs were licked and the limeys and the wops were licked.
1947		D. Davin For the Rest of Our Lives 246: What if the Buckshee Frogs are still holding Bir Hacheim, good luck to them.
1954		K. Amis letter 3 Jan. in Leader (2000) 358: Every review page and publisher’s advertisement is bespattered with novels by foreign swine, mostly frogs and dagoes.
1966		T. Keyes All Night Stand 53: I don’t like foreigners. I don’t like those frogs when we had to go to Paris.
1977		(con. 1941) R. Beilby Gunner 281: She was sitting at the next table, drinking with a lanky Free Frenchman. The Frog was drunk.
1980		Hepworth & Hindle Boozing out in Melbourne Pubs 15: There was a time [...] when to drink wine as an ordinary tipple in Melbourne Town was to be branded as an alcoholic derelict, a poof, a frog or woglike alien.
1983		N. Proffitt Gardens of Stone (1985) 34: You go tell that tall cocksucker [...] or I’ll kick his Frog ass back to the swamp you two cunt-licking snail eaters come from.
1995		B. James Detective is Dead (1996) 57: This you would never get from Frogs.
2005		J. Stahl I, Fatty 79: That fake Frog Lehrman yelled ‘Action!’.
2015		N. Cummins Tales of the Honey Badger [ebook] [photo caption] June 2014. Celebrating a big win over the Frogs.
2023		R. Milward Man-Eating Typewriter 33: [T]he Occupation was merely a pogi inconvenience for the frogs.

3. (US) a contemptible person.

1856		N.O. Weekly Delta 23 Nov. p.1 in A.P. Hudson Humor of the Old Deep South (1936) n.p.: The lower rejin of Loozeana, to that sitty of unhearn-of wikkedness, frogs, katfish and Frenchmen, called Orleans.
1883		T.B. Reed Willoughby Captains (1887) 179: Telson is the most conceited ignorant schoolhouse frog I ever saw.

4. (Aus.) a French franc.

1919

Aussie (France) X Jan. 2/1: A bunch of Diggers were playing it [i.e. two-up] near Charleroi when the Prince of Wales blew up. The Prince pushed his frame in and risked ten ‘frogs’ and won.

5. the French language.

1922		E. Hemingway letter 20 Mar. in Baker Sel. Letters (1981) 65: Do you speak frawg?
1954		W. Faulkner Fable 371: ‘Ask him,’ he said, indicating the driver. ‘You can speak Frog.’.
1962		R. Cook Crust on its Uppers 46: Well up to frog. And Spanish. Some Eyetie.
1995		Gazette (Montreal) 22 Jan. 4: The squareheads, who didn’t speak frog, dismissed the erudite young frog as a crackpot.

6. (Can.) a French-Canadian.

1978		R. Caron Go-Boy! 257: Give it to the frog!
1983		Maledicta VII 22: The English […] began calling the French frog eater, frog [...] and the like. We borrowed these Britishisms, and especially after WWI applied them to French immigrants, Quebeckers in the United States, and their distant relatives, the Acadians in Louisiana.

7. (US) a Cajun.

1983

I.L. Allen Lang. of Ethnic Conflict 45: acadians: [...] coon-ass [also coonie] [...] frenchie, -y; frog [cf. frog for French and French Canadians]; swamp-rat.