jelly n.1
1. semen; vaginal fluid; also attrib.
| [ |  | Progress of the Soul xxiii: A female fishes sandie Roe With the males ielly newly lev’ned was]. |
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Beggar’s Bush III i: Give her cold jelly, / To take up her belly, / And once a day swinge her again. | |
| ‘Contentment’ in Merry Drollery Compleat (1875) I 161: Give me the Wench, that’s like a Tench, / In holding up her belly, / For to receive, and to conceive / The most heroick Jelly. | |
| (attrib.) Sodom II ii: In tyme of termes she offers him her Arse, / Or with her mouth sucks jelly from his Tarse. | |
| ‘Batchellors Answer’ Pepys Ballads (1987) V 196: For Maids Distempers we have Jelly Out-does all Physick. | |
| in Frisky Songster 20: No one in my storehouse shall jelly drops spend. | |
| Honest Fellow 9: When e’er your husband lies o’er your belly, ma’am, / Take special care [...] / Lest you might stop up his river of jelly. | |
| Peeping Tom (London) 13 52/3: ‘Quite liberal too, as to the pastry-cook’s jellies, for I believe no other jelly could be extracted from you!’. | |
| ‘The Horrible Fright’ in Pearl 2 Aug. 32: He thrusts, and he pokes, and he enters your belly, / Till the horrible monster is melted to jelly. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Nocturnal Meeting 31: Let me feel your jelly [...] Deluge me or I’ll bite your balls off. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | in Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (1992) II 724: She can’t shoot jelly in the other girl’s belly, / ’Cause girls ain’t built that way. | |
| ‘Hungy Calf Blues’ 🎵 But I’m gonna save my jelly mama / Gonna bring it right home to you. | |
| in Limerick (1953) 99: There was a young fellow named Kelly / Who preferred his wife’s ass to her belly. / He shrieked with delight / As he ploughed through the shite, / And filled up her hole with his jelly. | |
| Queens’ Vernacular. |
2. a buxom, pretty young woman [she ‘wobbles’].
| Dict. of Sl., Jargon and Cant. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| [perf. Harry Champion] ‘The Best That Money Can Buy’ 🎵 And oh she was such a love of a lump / I used to call her jelly because / She was so nice and plump. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 132: jelly [...] a girl easily made. | |
| [ | | Hoodlums (2021) 71: [of a brothel madame] Her movements were heavy as she walked behind the bar. Jello in all the flavors]. |
| Runnin’ Down Some Lines 243: jelly, jellyroll [...] 2. Attractive female. | |
| Dict. of Invective (1991) 218: Jelly, a good-looking woman. |
3. (US black) the penis or the vagina.
| poem in (ed.) New Pelican Guide to Eng. Lit. I (rev. edn 1982) 588: I have a jelif of Godis sonde, / Withoutyn fyt it can stonde, / It can smytyn, and haght non honde; / Ryd yourself quat it may be. | |
| Negro Workaday Songs 112: Why I like Roberta so, / She rolls her jelly / Like she roll her dough. | |
| ‘New Salty Dog’ 🎵 She got good jelly / She sells it hot. | |
| [song title] Jelly, Jelly. | |
| ‘Ration Blues’ 🎵 I like to wake up in the morning with my jelly by my side / Since rationing started baby, you just take your stuff and hide. | |
| (con. 1930s) Lawd Today 152: You talk like I don’t know how to whip a woman’s jelly [...] I can whip it till the butter comes. |
4. (US black) sexual intercourse.
| [song title] You’ll Never Miss Your Jelly Till You’re Jelly Roller’s Gone. | |
| ‘Ration Blues’ 🎵 I got to cut down on my jelly / It takes sugar to make it sweet. | |
| ‘Vernacular of the Jazz World’ in AS XXXII:4 279: jelly. Sex. | |
| 5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases. | |
| Get Your Ass in the Water (1974) 192: Shine O Shine, please save me, / I give you more jelly than your eyes can see. | |
| Runnin’ Down Some Lines 150: Expressions like ‘I’m gonna get me some [...] jelly’ [...] reflect a sense of sweet-tasting sex, of nourishment, of being fed. |
5. (US black) anything given free.
| New Hepsters Dict. in Calloway (1976) 257: jelly (n.): anything free, on the house. | |
| ‘Jiver’s Bible’ in Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive. |
6. (US black) male sexual prowess; sexuality; esp. in phr. it must be jelly, ’cause jam don’t shake like that
| ‘Story in Harlem Sl.’ in Novels and Stories (1995) 1001: Well, he put it in the street that when it came to filling that long-felt need, sugar-curing the ladies’ feelings, he was in a class by himself and nobody knew his name, so he had to tell ’em. ‘It must be Jelly, ’cause jam don’t shake.’. |
7. (UK drugs) temazepam; usu. in pl. as jellies [the gel-like content of the capsules].
![[Scot]](/static/img/flags/sco.png "Scotland") | Glasgow Herald 2 June 6/6: [He] told the High Court in Glasgow...they were stopped by youths and one asked: ‘Do you want to buy jellies (the drug temazepam)?’ . | |
| Trainspotting 177: The state-sponsored addiction: substitute methadone for smack, the sickly jellies, three a day, for the hit. | |
| Grits 275: Wharrah do instead is, a eat tha temazepam jelly tharrah was plannin on neckin later. | |
| Outlaws (ms.) 37: It’s too easy to cop out and take Prozac and that, jellies or whatever. | |
![[NZ]](/static/img/flags/nz.png "New Zealand") | Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 95/2: jelly n. a temazepam capsule. | |
| Gutted 228: ‘You sorted, pal?’ ‘What about some jellies?’. | |
| Ringer [ebook] n.p.: ‘Got any jellies, Stauner?’ It’s some wee ned I don’t even know, but he knows my handle. |
8. see jellhead n.
In derivatives
(US) cowardly.
| Sunbury Gaz. (PA) 28 Dec. 1/8: [T]he same class of jelly-backed snivelers [...] who sweetly interceded for the contrite rebels of the South. | |
| Transactions of Incorporated Gas Institute (London) 24: He regretted that Mr Newbigging had been so ‘jelly-backed’ and so sentimental as to listen to such an ignorant and foolish protest. | |
| Prisoner at the Bar 185: [A] jelly-backed wearer of the [judge’s] gown who was afraid of the displeasure of some politician if a ‘heeler’ were convicted. | |
| Cong. Record A-998: [W]eak-kneed, jelly-backed, slab-sided, half-baked, parasitical, long-haired mugwumps. | |
| My Name Is Child of God 46: [H]is long, illicit affair with that greedy, gold-digging, weak-kneed, jelly-backed, jaw-jackin, spineless, pay-check robbing, childhood-stealing, dirty, lying, grave-maker, face-painted washed-up hussy of a mistress named alcohol. |
In compounds
1. secretions from the anus or vagina during or after intercourse.
| Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.]. |
2. (drugs) amphetamine.
| Underground Dict. (1972). | |
| ONDCP Street Terms 13: Jelly baby — Amphetamine. |
1. the scrotum [bag n.1 (1a)].
| Sl. and Its Analogues. |
2. the vagina .
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 39: Bissac, m. The female pudendum; ‘the jelly-bag’. |
3. (Aus.) term of abuse for a fat person [or fig. use of sense 2, e.g. a cunt n. (4)].
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Tell Morning This 19: ‘Before I’d let a fat jellybag and a dirty little rat stand over me, I’d call every rozzer in the force’. |
(orig. US) the vagina.
| Candy (1970) 73: Dr Dunlap hastily placed his hand on the pulsing jelly-box he’d exposed. | |
| Queens’ Vernacular. | |
| Dict. of Obscenity etc. |
(US black) a used sanitary pad or tampon.
| Corruption Officer [ebook] Ch. 31: The Captain looked and then jumped back and so did I. In her bag was a Jelly Doughnut aka a used Kotex. |
an inn (and/or brothel) frequented by prostitutes, criminals, rakes, etc.
| Whitehall Eve. Post 3 Jan.-1 Apr. n.p.: The Royal Jelly House in Pall-Mall. | |
| Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies xiii: [B]agnios encrease [sic], and [...] they, as well as tavenrns and jelly-shops, never saw such halycon days as now are. | |
| Midnight Spy (c.1929) 29: They entered a house, in Bridges-street, vulgarly denominated a Jelly-house [...] This scene, said [their guide] is a prelude to every kind of vice, folly, and debauchery that lust and liquor can possibly incite. | |
| Gentleman’s Mag. Nov. 593/1: Jenny [...] was a Covent-garden-bred wench, who had lived at a jelly-house. | |
| New London Spy [subtitle] [A] true picture of modern high and low life; from the splendid mansions in St. James’s to the subterraneous habitations of St. Giles’s, wherein are displayed the various scenes of Covent-Garden, and its environs, the theatres, Jelly-houses, Gaming-houses, Night-houses, Cottages, Masquerades, Mock-Masquerades, Public-gardens, and other places of entertainments. | |
| 17 Apr. [print title] The Jelly-House Maccaroni. | |
| Complete Modern London Spy 76: A Jelly-House / This, said Mr Ambler, is one of those places whither effeminate beaux sometimes resort of a morning, and rakes and girls of the town [etc] . | |
| Stranger’s Guide n.p.: Procuresses […] are to be met with at the jelly-houses, milliners, perfume-shops. |
ejaculated semen, covering the face and throat of one’s partner.
| Roger’s Profanisaurus 3 in Viz 98 Oct. 18: jelly jewellery n. The earrings, nose-studs, fancy spectacles and other facial adornments a lucky lady sometimes receives when her partner had intended to give her a pearl necklace. | |
| ‘A Day In The Life Of...’ 29 Apr. 🌐 Instead of firing my ‘baby gravy’ over her belly and tits due to my excitement I ended up giving her a ‘pearl necklace’ and other ‘jelly jewellery’ to match. |
(US black) a sanitary towel.
| Runnin’ Down Some Lines 157: There are also a variety of graphic expressions to characterize sanitary napkins – rag, diaper, jellyroll, jelly sandwich. |
(US black) the hands.
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | Big House 25: He got his jelly-snatchers on some ancient manuscripts. |
In phrases
(US black) a phr. used between males to express their appreciation of an especially attractive female.
| Lib. Congress Catalog of Copyright Entries 1602/2: It must be jelly cause jam don’t shake like that; by George Williams and J.C. MacGregor [...] Sept. 1 1942. | |
| Mad mag. Dec.–Jan. 24: It must be gookum, ’cause jam don’t shake like that . | |
| Mad mag. Sept. 4: They must be jelly-beans ’cause jam-beans don’t shake like that. | |
| ‘Hell’ in Fireworks (1988) 190: The ol’ eighty-eighty [...] a-rockin’ with the glorious tidings that ‘It Must Be Jelly, ’Cause Jam Don’t Shake Like That’. | |
| Bambi and Friends No.1 [comic strip] Hmmm...(It must be jelly ’cause jam don’t shake like that). | |
| Portable Promised Land (ms.) 154: We Words. My Favorite Things [...] Must be jelly cuz jam doan shake like dat! |
of a woman, to masturbate.
| Sl. and Its Analogues. |
SE in slang uses
In compounds
see separate entries .
1. fat.
| ‘The Flag of Their Country’ in Complete Stalky & Co. (1987) 221: I was in the study, doin’ a simply lovely poem about the Jelly-bellied Flag-flapper. | |
| Out West 27-8 255: Now, where's that jelly-bellied Dutch cook gone to? | |
| Princess Cecilia 22: Tewfik, huge and jelly-bellied, bore down on them with wrath in his eye. | |
| Unexpected 20: I admit that I did call Captain a goggle- eyed, jelly-bellied bastard. |
2. (Aus./US, also jelly-belly) cowardly.
| Windsor Mag. 88 508: The brave jingle their medals as they sink into armchairs at the club, while the jelly-bellied have soft white arms to comfort them. | |
| Thunderbolt and Lightfoot 100: You gettin’ jelly-belly over the deal you promoted your own self? [HDAS]. |
1. a fat person; also attrib.
| Era (London) 14 Nov. 4/1: Them waz my thorts, Guvnor, until they waz broken in upon by jelly belly Morris. | |
| Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 92/1: When we emerged into open daylight there was fat old jelly belly still in the arms of Morpheus. | |
| Chelmsford Chron. 18 Dec. 6/6: I was driving my cart in Leyton when the defendant Grist came behind me and called me ‘— old jellybelly’. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Liza of Lambeth (1966) 6: You jolly well dry up, old jelly-belly. | |
| S.F. Call 9 Nov. 4/6: You’re a good fellow, old jelly-belly. | |
| Valley of the Moon (1914) 196: Old Jelly Belly’s got three bullet holes in him, but he ain’t goin’ to die. | |
| Menorah Mag. Apr. 464: A blond mustache, a hairless head, / A jelly belly, always fed. / Think kindly of our little paunches. | |
| Harper’s Mag. 179 n.p.: We called him Slob, or Jelly-Belly. Because, you see, poor Jo was the local fat boy. |
2. (Aus./US) a coward.
| Eat of Me, I Am the Savior 90: There were [...] a jelly-belly or two who had secretly admired Nicholas in private while he had damned him in public [HDAS]. | |
| DSUE (8th edn) 615: since ca. 1935. |
see separate entry .
see separate entries .
see separate entries .
In phrases
(US) a notably fat person.
| Und. Speaks 18/2: Can of jelly, a fat belly. | |
| Minnesota Daily (U. Minn.) 🌐 27 Sept. When he hurried, his stomach was like a bowl of jelly – his fat was like waves going back and forth. |
see under juice n.1
see under juice n.1