Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. fine, splendid, jolly.

c.1864		A. Stephens ‘The Chickaleary Cove’ 🎵 I have a rorty gal, also a knowing pal, / And merrily together we jog on.
1876		Sheffield Dly Teleg. 9 Nov. 3/2: To his ‘firm pal,’ Jack, he bequeaths his favourite jemmy; to his ‘Rotty [sic] Cully,’ Bill, his ‘ticker,’ which he ‘bunged from the old cove on Denmark-hill; and to his ‘Leary Bloke,’ Bob, his unexpired ticket-of-leave.
1878		Era (London) 3 Mar. 4: ‘Ginger Sal,’ who knows a ‘Rorty Coster,’ as she puts it.
1887		W.E. Henley ‘Culture in the Slums’ in Farmer Musa Pedestris (1896) 178: For in such rorty wise doth Love express / His blooming views, and asks for your address.
1889		Dead Bird (Sydney) 16 Nov. 3/2: The Dead Bird is the liveliest, crispest, rortiest, freshest, flyest paper ever published.
1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 26 July 3/2: ‘Just to get a taste of her own ridiculous, rorty old Rooster’.
1894		E.W. Rogers [perf. Marie Lloyd] The Barmaid 🎵 ‘Ror-ty bit o’ crackling don’t you think so?’.
1896		A. Morrison Child of the Jago (1982) 147: The gonophs down our alley they calls ’er Rorty Sal.
1903		T.W.H. Crosland ‘M.C.’ in Five Notions 23: Let’s ’ave a drink at the Savage. Here’s to the rorty M.C.!
1910		Sun. Times (Perth) 19 May 2nd sect. 9/1: They Say [...] That the honor of being the belle of the rink is claimed by three Starlings. That each is positively certain she is the rortiest roller on the rink.

2. (also roarty, rorty-torty) boisterous, rowdy, noisy; also as a nickname; also as adv. (see cit. 1878), and rortily.

1870		London & Provincial Entr’acte 1 Oct. 6/2: ‘Ikey Bill’ and ‘Rorty Tom’ both turned up and put down their thrums.
1878		‘’Arry at the Play’ in Punch 2 Nov. in P. Marks (2006) 39: I’ve bin going the rounds rare and rorty. [Ibid.] 40: So o river, Yours rortily, ’ARRY.
1884		Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday 8 May 7/2: [title] The Bloomin’ Flower of Rorty Gulch.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 24 Jan. 5/1: You say, in one of these contributions, ‘Squinny-eyed Liz is nuts on the Rorty Snob from Miller’s flat.’ [Ibid.] 28 Mar. 11/3: ‘Now, Dubbo Kate, you shall be let alone if you tell me what has become of Rorty Johnson. We want him for a super and slang!’ This is when they are ‘on the track.’ When they’ve got a clue, they sit in a pub. all day, and gaze attentively up at the wrong house.
1892		‘Fanny Flukem’s Ball’ in Bird o’ Freedom (Sydney) in J. Murray Larrikins (1973) 39: Now listen, rorty bummers, / And line up where I stand.
1892		Morris & LeBrunn [perf. Vesta Tilley] The Smile 🎵 See ’em down at Piccadilly, there’s Marie and rorty Ted.
c.1900		‘My Name It Is McCarty’ in Seal (1999) 41: My name it is McCarty and I’m a rorty party / I’m rough and tough as an old man kangaroo.
1906		Burra Record (SA) 18 Apr. 5/5: They Say [...] That Hanson people had a rorty-torty time on Good Friday [Ibid.] 30 May 5/1: They Say [...] That the lads and lassies are in high hopes of having a rorty-torty tip-toe on Monday night.
1909		G.R. Bacchus Pleasure Bound ‘Ashore’ 91: ‘I’m reckoned the rorty one of the team’.
1909		N.Z. Truth 30 Jan. 5/1: Rangers reckon the pair were rorty.
1912		Arrow (Sydney) 4 May 8/3: The black, velvet-faced, light tweed coat, and the huge plate-sized buttons and ‘roarty’ air of the stage London hawker.
1914		‘Bartimeus’ ‘Farewell and Adieu!’ in Naval Occasions 144: And I’ve heard her talking like a Mother to a rorty Midshipman – a silly young ass who was drinking like a fish and wasting his money and health pub-crawling.
1925		(con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 245: Rorty: Used of a man always in trouble.
1932		I.L. Idriess Flynn of the Inland 280: Joe had relapsed to camels and his opinion of those beasts was as ‘rorty’ as a local dust-storm.
1936		Sun. Times (Perth) 19 Jan. 28/2: The haughty girl, the rorty girl, Don’t kiss me ’cos it’s naughty’ girl.
1950		C. Harris Three-Ha’Pence to the Angel 89: Now don’t get all rorty, don’t go up in the air.
1957		G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 2: If somebody gets rorty and mucks up the show [...] chuck ’im into the Alley.
1968		(con. 1940s) G. Dutton Andy 47: If you are feeling rorty and passionate [...] then you can loop it and roll it and fly it so low the prop cuts grass.
1985		B. Humphries Traveller’s Tool 26: The bucks night had been a pretty rorty affair.

3. of behaviour, speech etc, coarse, earthy, crudely comic; sexually aggressive.

1879		London Life 24 May 5/1: [T]hat ‘rorty’ or ‘norty’ song of Stella de Vere's, ‘I’ve lost my key’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 1 Aug. 12/1: Lord St. Leonards, the ‘rorty’ haughty noble who recently got into trouble for forcing his titled attentions upon a servant-maid, when ‘master was out,’ announces his intention of honouring Australia with a visit.
1899		R. Whiteing No. 5 John Street 95: A right-down ‘raughty gal’ leading her alley to battle against the Roman ‘slops.’.
c.1900		‘Ramrod’ Nocturnal Meeting 21: The now excited and rorty girl said — Doesn’t that make you feel good, Harry?
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 17 July 1/1: The amorous propensities of a seaside lawmaker are earning him an unenviable reputation [...] no maiden meandering about after dark is safe from his gloatsome glances and ‘Good Night, Gerties’.
1916		C.J. Dennis ‘Introduction’ in Moods of Ginger Mick ix: Jist to intrajuice me cobber, an’ ’is name is Ginger Mick – / A rorty boy, a naughty boy, wiv rude ixpressions thick.