hand, v. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

hand v.

[ext. of SE]

(US)

1. to inflict a blow, to impress upon, to conquer.

1899		W.J. Kountz Billy Baxter’s Letters 4: Teddy handed me a few of his kind little remarks, and I got back at him with something personal. He got sore.
1899		Anaconda Standard (MT) 10 Apr. 8/7: You fellows come along and see me give him his trimmings. [...] I’m going right down and hand him a couple.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 90: He’s in luck I didn’t hand him one.
1911		E. Dyson ‘The Fickle Dolly Hopgood’ in Benno and Some of the Push 61: Give us the strength iv it, Ned. Did yeh hand him the pass out?
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 247: I got so mad at him, that I handed him a couple of punches.
1933		C.G. Booth ‘Stag Party’ in Penzler Pulp Fiction (2006) 100: Monty, you jam your gun in his kidneys. Hand it to him if he squawks.
1953		J. Thompson Savage Night (1991) 8: I’d been waiting for an excuse to hand one to Fruit Jar.

2. to tell with intent to deceive, e.g. hand someone a line of nonsense, to talk nonsense.

1897		Ade Pink Marsh (1963) 130: ’At’s sutny ’e hottes’ thing you handed me yet.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 118: Do yuh s’pose they’s any use handin’ her a talk?
1913		J. London Valley of the Moon (1914) 172: Nitsky on damages – contributory negligence, [...] something-or-other flimflam. That’s what the courts handed her.
1928		C. McKay Home to Harlem 66: Don’t hand me none o’ that fairy stuff, for I ain’t gwine to swallow it.
1938		D. Runyon ‘Madame La Gimp’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 246: Most guys are trying to hand him the old phonus bolonus.
1942		Z.N. Hurston Dust Tracks On a Road (1995) 678: Oh, don’t hand me that stuff! [...] Don’t be such an Uncle Tom.
1956		‘Ed Lacy’ Men from the Boys (1967) 21: And don’t hand me that honest-citizen crap. Lande’s story is so wacky it can be true.
1969		H. Rap Brown Die Nigger Die! 48: ‘You saw it!’ I yelled. ‘Don’t come handing me that.’.
1972		(con. 1950s) Jacobs & Casey Grease II iv: Just a minute, Miss Goody-Goody! Who do you think you are? Handing me all this sympathy crap!
1976		R. Carver Stories (1985) 333: ‘Jesus, what are you talking about? [...] Don’t hand me that’.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 65: don’t hand me that Dismissal of speaker’s claim, eg, ‘Don’t hand me that load of malarkey.’.

3. to tip.

1912

H.G. Van Campen ‘Life on Broadway’ in McClure’s Mag. Dec. 177/1: Them dolls from the middle West needs to be learned I ain’t lookin’ up no numbers if 1 don’t git handed.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

hand-me-down shop (n.) [SE hand-me-down shop, a second-hand clothes shop]

an illicit pawnbroker’s.

1868		‘She Danced Like a Fairy’ in Rootle-Tum Songster 45: He father sold goods on a second-hand plan [...] he now has a ‘hand-me-down’ shop.
1909		J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era 7/2: Ammedown Shop (Poor). Corruption of Hand-me-down Shop A good example of a phrase getting bastardized into one meaningless word. [Ibid.] 149/2: Hand-me-down shop (Poor). Illegal pawnbroker’s.
1914		Joyce ‘Ivy Day in the Committee Room’ Dubliners (1956) 121: I suppose he forgets the time his little old father kept the hand-me-down shop in Mary’s Lane [...] And the men used to go in on Sunday morning before the houses were open to buy a waiscoat or a trousers – moya!

In phrases

hand in one’s checks (v.)

see under check n.¹

hand in one’s chips (v.)

see under chip n.²

hand in one’s dinner-pail (v.) (also pass in one’s dinner pail)

1. to die.

1905		A. Binstead Mop Fair 63: Evenlyn Godolphin Prospect [...] passed in his dinner pail.
1937		P. Cheyney Dames Don’t Care (1960) 52: One day this guy peters out. He gives a big howl and hands in his dinner pail.
1949		Wodehouse Mating Season 189: It was about due to hand in it’s dinner pail.
1985		P. Mayhew One Family’s War 125: So if, by any subsequent mail, / You hear that he’s passed in his dinner-pail, / And wonder how bravely he met the foe, / You may bet your boots that it wasn’t so.
1992		K. Lette Llama Parlour 6: ‘He’s fallen off his perch [...] He’s handed in his dinner plate.’ Still she didn’t get it. ‘He’s dead, damn it!’.
2003		H.W. Howard San Diego’s Hysterical Hist. 135: The man who knew where the hill is located handed in his dinner pail 101 years ago.

2. to resign from one’s job; to stop what one is doing.

1939

P. Cheyney Don’t Get Me Wrong (1956) 75: This is where I hand in my dinner pail [...] I sorta feel you boys are goin’ to be rough with me.

hand it out (v.) (also hand it to)

(US) to harm, to kill.

1927		H.C. Witwer Classics in Sl. 73: A pig for punishment and a spendthrift at handin’ it out.
1931		P.J. Wolfson Bodies are Dust (2019) [ebook] ‘Stein got his last night.’ ‘That baby was riding for a flop. How’d they hand it to him?’.
1939		P. Cheyney Don’t Get Me Wrong (1956) 51: I reckon I have been a bit of a mug sleepin’ in this place [...] with an empty gun. Anybody coulda handed it out to me pronto if they’d wanted to.
1940		G. Meek ‘London’ in Station Days in Maoriland (1952) 100: A funny sort o’ quiver seems to grip you in its spell, / As you read how they can take it – and hand it out as well.

hand it to (v.)

1. to tell off, to reprimand, to tease.

1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 9: She’ll hand it to him before he goes to the show-shop.
1912		Van Loan ‘Loosening Up of Hogan’ in Ten-Thousand-Dollar Arm 134: You handed it to him just right, Harry.

2. (orig. US black) to shoot at someone; to attack.

1912		A.H. Lewis Apaches of N.Y. 23: ‘What was that shooting?’ ‘Oh, a couple of geeks started to hand it to each other.’.
1917		B.E.F. Times 10 Apr. (2006) 196/1: Write me down for a two-cent boob if I don’t hand it to Willie.
1942		R. Chandler High Window 465: I hand it to her. I’d like to hand it to her with an elephant gun, but my polite breeding restrains me.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 90/1: Hand it to one. To assault; to shoot.

hand-me-down-the-moon (n.)

(Irish/Cork) a tall person.

2015

L. McInerney Glorious Heresies 90: ‘A right hand-me-down-the-moon. You couldn’t miss him’.

hand out

see separate entries.

hand over (v.)

see separate entries.

hand someone one (v.)

see give someone one under one n.¹

hand someone the hat (v.)

to reject, to dismiss.

1911		S. Ford Torchy 198: He was figurin’ on handin’ me my hat as I was shot out.
1915		G. Bronson-Howard God’s Man 200: Get his money – all you can – and then hand him his hat.
1923		Wodehouse Inimitable Jeeves 21: The fuse has blown out and the girl has handed him his hat.
1936		(con. 1920s) Dos Passos Big Money in USA (1966) 774: Henry Ford handed the banker his hat, and went about raising the money in his own way.
1949		Wodehouse Mating Season 36: She would hand him his hat and make me happy.
1971		H.E. Roberts Third Ear n.p.: hand you your hat urge you to leave.

hand someone the ice-bowl (v.) [i.e. to treat coldly]

to offer a rejection, to fail to pay a debt.

1905

A. Binstead Mop Fair 146: It galls me like sin to have to hand you the ice-bowl once again.

hand someone the kick-along (v.)

(UK tramp) to refuse someone something.

1932

M. Marshall Travels of Tramp-Royal 96: That slop’ll pinch me for keeps if you hand me the kick-along. [Ibid.] 320: hand me the kick-along, refuse me.