Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a sexual offender, spec. of young children; also attrib.

1970		T. Parker Frying-Pan 39: ‘Nonces’ is short for ‘nonsenses’: sex cases, professional mental patients who live in a world of their own, they never really talk to anyone.
1977		G.F. Newman A Prisoner’s Tale 46: A hanger-on wouldn’t dream of getting his food before a right villain, but would come before the nonces.
1989		M. Amis London Fields 80: The child-molester – the nonce, the short eyes – was the lowest of the low.
1998		J. Hoskison Inside 34: A nonce is a sex offender, child molestor, anything dodgy.
2005		B. Hare Urban Grimshaw 7: You’d have thought that Social Services had kidnapped her kids and were using them as sex toys. She referred to all social workers as ‘nonces.’.
2012		(con. 1980s) I. Welsh Skagboys 49: Gilbert O’Sullivan wrote that fuckin nonce song aboot beastin bairns.
2013		K. Sampson Killing Pool 298: Do you want to go down as a nonce [...] Do you want the world to know you’re a rapist, Terry?
2017		A. Parks Bloody January 1: The whole spectrum of Glasgow’s wrongdoers [...] From rapists and murderers, nonces and kiddie fiddlers to bewildered old men caught coming out the Co-op with two tins of salmon stuffed up their jumpers.
2021		C. Moran in Times Mag. 6 Nov. 9/2: The word I hear teen using with the most vim is ‘paedo’, alongside ‘nonce’, ‘incel’, and ‘a bit rape-y’.

2. a general term of (usu.) abuse; also attrib.

1994		I. Welsh ‘The Shooter’ in Acid House 9: That fucking smarmy nonce face.
1998		Guardian 23 Oct. 16: Big soft-hearted nonce.
2005		B. Hare Urban Grimshaw 24: The kinky new yuppie townhouses by the canal where the nonces lived.

3. nonsense, rubbish.

1999

Guardian Sport 16 Apr. 16: I could use a good time to take my mind off all this nonce.

4. (N.Z. prison) a homosexual.

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 125/2: nonce n. 1 a homosexual.