Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK Und., also dasy) a diamond.

1747

Life and Character of Moll King 12: I heard she made a Fam To-night, a Rum one, with Dainty Dasies.

2. anything or anyone particularly appealing, excellent [moved to the US in the 19C, then returned to the UK at end of the century].

1757		Foote Author in Works (1799) I 148: Oh daisy; that’s charming.
1833		W. Carleton Traits and Stories of Irish Peasantry III 354: Give us the hand of you, you bloomer! Och, och! faith you’re the daisey!
1836		T. Haliburton Clockmaker I 115: I raised a four year old colt once [...] a real daisy, a perfect doll.
1854		D. Jerrold Heart of Gold Act I: Molly’s a lamb – a duck – and a daisy.
1880		Brenham Wkly Banner (TX) 9 Sept. 3/1: Persons visiting the city should not fail to visit our compres. [sic] It’s a perfect daisy.
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Apr. 3/4: ‘You girls call your sweethearts ‘darlings,’ and you men call yours ‘daises,’ [sic] and you girls are afraid to come up here for fear some other girls will get off with your ‘darlings,’ and you men for fear some other men will get away with your ‘daisies’ .
1881		River Press (Ft Benton, MT) 9 Mar. 6/2: Pauline Tesley — I tell you, boss, she was a daisy.
1882		Nat. Police Gaz. 21 Oct. cover: [pic. caption] ‘Oh! But Ain’t I the Daisy?’ Case of Too Much Reflection.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 31 Jan. 7/3: Albert Pel is a party who may be reckoned as quite a daisy in his own particular profession.
1887		‘’Arry on His Critics’ in Punch 17 Dec.. 280/1: I’m a daisy, dear boy, and no ’eeltaps!
1890		Music Hall & Theatre Rev. 5 July 7/2: [used ironically, of a puritan] Ain’t they daisies, these leg inspectors.
1892		Kipling ‘Fuzzy-Wuzzy’ in Barrack-Room Ballads (1893) 152: ’E’s a daisy, ’e’s a ducky, ’e’s a lamb!
1894		Truth (Sydney) 14 Jan. 6/6: He comes across a chump that had gaunts and he was a daisy.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 50: De Duchess had her first scrap wid de nurse. Say, dat was a daisy.
1901		Boy’s Own Paper 27 Apr. 466: My, you are a daisy!
1902		D. St John Memoirs of Madge Buford 102: ‘Jolly, you’re a daisy,’ he said.
1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 27 Feb. 2/6: He got home some daisies on Bert’s chivvy.
c.1905		J. Furphy Buln-Buln and the Brolga (1948) 🌐 David [...] was just such a daisy as you might expect a woman to love. He was brave, chivalrous, and accomplished.
1914		W. Sickert New Age 19 Mar. 631: It is not what I once heard my old friend the sub-editor of the ‘New York Herald’ describe as ‘A daisy story,’ but it is what the sporting touts call ‘a stone ginger’.
1915		Sport (Adelaide) 22 Jan. 5/3: D is for Dick, a daisy for Burke.
1920		‘Sapper’ Bulldog Drummond 211: Oh you daisy [...] you pair of priceless beans!
1931		E. Conkle ‘Madge’ in Botkin Folk-Say 163: Ort t’ be a reg’lar mountain daisy, Pratt. Shore ort!
1943		(con. 1850s) G.A. Little Malachi Horan Remembers 24: She was galloped once from the farm at Jobstown to Flood’s Inn [...] all to fetch her master a bottle of whiskey. She was the daisy!
1953		S.J. Perelman letter 23 June in Crowther Don’t Tread on Me (1987) 138: It [a radio broadcast] sure was a daisy.
1957		(con. 1943) A. Myrer Big War 9: Al, you’re a daisy.
1965		J. Thompson Texas by the Tail (1994) 57: ‘Gee, dad! [...] You’re a daisy!’.
1986		L. Heinemann Paco’s Story (1987) 3: Here and there and yonder among the corpses are some prize-winning, leg-pulling daisies.
1999		Observer Screen 1 Aug. 18: I pulled off an absolute daisy-cruncher.

3. the vagina [euph.].

1834		‘Her Ladyship’s Daisey’ in Flash Chaunter 33: Said John, I though my lady’s daisey, / You would not wish folks for to see.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

4. a term of affection.

1873

W.H. Thomes Bushrangers 421: ‘And where will yer go, my daisy?’.

5. (US campus) one who is credulous, gullible.

1880		Ford County Globe 17 Feb. in Miller & Snell Why the West was Wild 406: He was what the boys would call a ‘daisy’.
1896		W.C. Gore Student Sl. in Cohen (1997) 12: daisy n. […] Sometimes applied in an ironical sense to one who is foolish or credulous.
1904		‘G.B. Lancaster’ Sons O’ Men 216: He won’t make the clean pertater out o’ this waster. A daisy – that’s what he is. A slap-up daisy.
1908		Sun. Times (Perth) 9 Feb. 4/8: You’re a daisy to go doing your gold in with that thieving mob.
1994		J. O’Connor Secret World of the Irish Male (1995) 1956: Don’t be such a bleedin’ daisy.

6. (US) a notably attractive young woman; a female partner.

c.1876		‘Mrs. Brady’s Daughter’ [broadside ballad] She’s such a daisy, she sets me crazy .
1880		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 31 Jan. 14/1: [A] genuine Thompson street sport with his ‘daisy’ on his arm.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 31 Jan. 9/2: And for a well-conducted daisy we know no fate more melancholy than being ravished from her bed, tied up with gaudier blossoms who sneered at her in life, and ‘chucked,’ for the twentieth time, out of a stage-box by a fat man in goggles to a bold woman in tights.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 106: She’s a doisy, and just seventeen.
1900		T. Dreiser Sister Carrie 42: Hello. You’re a daisy.
1905		A. Binstead Mop Fair 4: Cleopatra, Marc Antony’s Alexandrian daisy.
1911		J. Lomax Cowboy Songs 252: She’s my daisy, Sunday-best-day girl.
1914		Truth (Melbourne) 14 Mar. 12/5: For she are a cuteish daisy / / And knows just how to begin.
1927		C. Sandburg ‘My Lulu’ in Amer. Songbag 378: My Lulu gal’s a daisy.
1929		(con. c.1900s) J.B. Booth London Town 81: Maisie is a daisy! / Maisie is a dear!
1931		in Randolph & Legman Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (1992) II 738: Teacher, teacher is a daisy.
1958		D. Burley N.Y. Amsterdam News 22 Mar. 13: [Y]ou’re a real crazy little daisy.
1958		J. Arden Live Like Pigs X: Eh you’d never see him. All you’d be seeing’s that daisy from the next house, ent it?
1991		R. Doyle Van (1998) 419: She’s a daisy, said Jimmy Sr.

7. (Aus.) a perfect blow.

1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 1 Nov. 7/4: Once more he was downed with a perfect daisy.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 20 Jan. 24/4: Murphy got most of the punishment, but bided his time until an opening offered in the 9th round, when a ‘daisy’ on the point sent Jack to rest.
1916		T. Burke Limehouse Nights 253: First time I ever knew you pop a daisy on yer brother, though.

8. a person.

1886		‘Lady Kate, the Dashing Female Detective’ in Roberts et al. Old Sleuth’s Freaky Female Detectives (1990) 14/2: I don’t know that ‘daisy’. Who is he?
1895		Truth (Sydney) 3 Mar. 4/7: A sign was put up at his shop informing his patrons all about the kind of daisy they were dealing with].
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 1 Dec. 12/3: The average operatic tenor is a modest daisy, and Louis Arens, one of Musgrove’s chief warblers, has been at some expense and trouble to prove it.

9. a drunkard.

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

10. a male homosexual.

1960, 1975		(ref. to c.1940) Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
1966		Trimble 5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases.

11. (US black) a housewife.

1983

R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].

12. see daisy chain n. (1)