Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. wide, baggy breeches or hose; thus slop-shop, a clothiers; slop seller, a clothier; modern use, trousers.

c.1392–3		Chaucer ‘Persone’s Tale’ De Superbia in Morris Poetical Works (1866) 297: The horrible disordant scantnes of clothing, as ben these cuttid sloppis [...] that thrugh her schortnes ne covereth not the schamful membres of man, to wickid entent.
1562		J. Heywood Sixt Hundred of Epigrams (1867) 217: Of a number of rattes mistaken for diuelles in a mans sloppes.
1592		Nashe Pierce Pennilesse 13: A paire of trunke slops, sagging down like a shoo-maker’s wallet.
1600		Dekker Shoemakers’ Holiday I i: God send thee to cramme thy slops with French crownes.
1611		L. Barry Ram-Alley IV i: Three pounds in gold These slops containe.
1612		J. Taylor Laugh and Be Fat 7: Thy auncient Ierkin, and thy aged sloppes, / From whose warme confines thy retainers drops.
1617		Middleton & Rowley A Fair Quarrel V i: chouch: (Sings.) I say, thy bride is a bronstrops. trim: (Sings.) And knows the thing that men wear in their slops.
c.1626		Dick of Devonshire in Bullen II (1883) II iv: Your horse and weapons I will take, but no pilferage. I am no pocketeer, no diver into slopps.
1630		J. Taylor ‘World’s Eighth Wonder’ in Works (1869) II 71: [as cit. 1612].
1640		H. Mill Nights Search I 58: The Teige dives downe into his slops.
1645		P. Fisher ‘A March’ in Carpenter Verse in English from Tudor & Stuart Eng. (2003) 259: Bigg were their Bulkes, yet were their Hose / And Buckram Sloppes more big than those.
1658		Mennis & Smith ‘The old Ballet of shepheard Tom’ Wit Restor’d (1817) 303: This plaguy flirt would [...] smile to see me tear, The locks from my haire / To scratch my chops, rend my slops.
1682		Mennis & Smith et al. ‘The West-Country Batchelors Complaint’ Wit and Drollery 91: With a pair of Buckram Zlops, / And a vlaunting baire of Garters.
1772		Bridges Burlesque Homer (3rd edn) 328: He in Borough kept a slop shop [...] From teucer’s bow an arrow pops, / And bum’p his guts through all his slops.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Slops, wearing apparel and bedding used by seamen. [Ibid.] Slop seller, a dealer in those articles, who keeps a slop shop.
1797		Bridges Burlesque Homer (4th edn) II 89: [as cit. 1772].
1812		J. Bell Jr. (ed.) Rhymes of Northern Bards 43: To some slop-shop now thou may go trudging / And lug out some squandering coins.
1822		(con. early 17C) Sir W. Scott Fortunes of Nigel I 22: The bard laughed, and fumbled in the pocket of his slops.
1830		Marryat King’s Own II 131: Tell Mr. Beaujou, the slopseller, to come here directly with some clothes.
1832		Currency Lad (Sydney) 3 Nov. 4/2: Well, the first thing (in course) I does, was to make for old Moses’ slop-shop, and to search for a suit of shore-going togs.
1839		T. Hood ‘Doves and the Crows’ Works (1862) IV 311: Your working garb indignantly renounce; / Discard your slops in honour of the day.
1840		R. Barham ‘The Dead Drummer’ Ingoldsby Legends (1842) 197: He would give an occasional hitch, / Sailor-like, to his ‘slops’.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 15 Jan. n.p.: You will know these slop shops by a [...] living feature [...] a cheating, defrujding, get the best of you Jew.
1849		Coleraine Chron. 1 Dec. 4/2: The ‘slop sellers’ of London would not furnish the Correspondent with the list of prices they are [...] paying to their work people [...] think the slop trade is the ruin of young girls.
1853		Bell’s Life in Sydney 27 Aug. 3/1: Drapers, slopsellers and such like, exhibit trousers more than other articles outside their shops.
1857		advert in ‘Ducange Anglicus’ Vulgar Tongue (1857) 45: The right sort of Ducks to make single and double-backed Slops for gentlemen in black.
1860		R. Nicholson Rogue’s Progress (1966) 10: The land-sharks, who, as a body, embraced publicans, pawnbrokers, lodging-house keepers, slop-sellers, pimps, crimps, and prostrates - fallen ones.
1864		J.R. Lowell Fireside Travels 148: We all go to the slop-shop and come out uniformed, every mother’s son.
1867		W.H. Smyth Sailor’s Word-Bk (1991) 633: Slops. A name given to ready-made clothes. [...] Slop-Shop. A place where ready-made clothing for seamen is sold.
1867		Sportsman 5 Dec. 2/1: Notes on News [...] The episcopal garments appertaining to the see of Lichfield have been at as much discount as the ‘old clo’ at a Houndsditch slop-shop.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1897		‘Mark Twain’ Tom Sawyer, Detective 24: I [...] tracked him to a second-hand slop-shop and see him buy a red flannel shirt.
1904		Truth (Brisbane) 10 Apr. 5/3: For his ‘seven and a kick,’ Gray got a pair of slops, the only use of which is to make a shoddy overcoat for his youngster.
1909		W.M. Raine Brand Blotters (1912) 22: Disguised though he was in cheap slops, she judged him a man of parts.
1936		(con. 1830s–60s) ‘Miles Franklin’ All That Swagger 43: He was dressed in slops, the rough shirt none too clean.

2. unspecified clothing.

c.1805		‘The Margate Hoy’ Jovial Songster 7: I took a few slops, such as shirts and a coat.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 75: Slops, [...] inexpensive clothing.