Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to abuse.

1600		Dekker Shoemakers’ Holiday III i: Maister, I hope yowle not suffer my dame to take downe your iourneymen.
1689–91		‘The Henpeckt Cuckold’ in Ebsworth Roxburghe Ballads (1891) VII:2 432: Let him that Widdow wooes, or courts a Maid to his Froe, / Take her down in her Wedding-Shooes: Else ’tis but a Word and a Blow.

2. to challenge, to overcome, to surpass; to kill.

1754		Foote Knights in Works (1799) I 84: I am glad here’s a husband coming that will take you down in your tantrums; you are grown too headstrong and robust for me.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 74/2: If she was only ‘rigged up’ as she deserved, she could take down all the ‘picking-up’ and worn-out heifers frequenting Fred Hogg’s and Bugger Tom’s.
1869		Derbys. Times 3 Nov. 4/1: I’m glad my aunt saw through her, the spiteful old catamaran; she rightly deserved taking down a little.
1873		Carleton Farm Ballads 19: And all of them was flustered, and fairly taken down, And I for a time was counted the luckiest man in town [F&H].
1893		J. Walsh [perf. Vesta Tilley] Fairly knocked the Yankees in Chicago 🎵 On the President I waited, who soon guessed and calculated / I might be well educated but the Yanks could take me down.
1900		Ade More Fables in Sl. (1960) 141: He had been Exposed to Matrimony so often without being Taken down.
1914		H. Lawson ‘Mitchell on the “Situation”’ in Roderick (1972) 716: At their last shanty spree together, English Bill had backed up Adelaide Adolphus to take down German Charley.
1923		Lucille Hegamin ‘Reckless Daddy’ 🎵 I just found out you called upon a gal uptown, / Your mama’s gonna take her papa down! / Oh, reckless daddy, reckless daddy, / I’m gonna make a wreck out of you!
1957		W.R. Burnett Underdog 5: [T]he tough guys [...] wanted to take him down, bend him to their will.
1977		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Black Gangster (1991) 95: It won’t make no difference if they take us down.
1994		T. Willocks Green River Rising 202: We took the whole fucken joint down in twenty fucken minutes.
2006		G. Iles Turning Angel 360: I’ll take that motherfucker down.
2013		T. Black ‘Eat Shit’ in Killing Time in Las Vegas [ebook] He [...] took down five, six guys who’d welched on a drags bet.
2020		S.A. Crosby Blacktop Wasteland 28: ‘That cancer, boy, it just takes ’em donw in by inch’.

3. (mainly Aus.) to cheat, to swindle, to rob; thus attrib.

1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 113/2: I was pleased with the idea of taking down a ‘starchy’ tight-fisted swaggerer like Bob Coombs.
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 11 Dec. 4/3: We don’t believe that the new chums whom Mr W.K. Thompson took down [...] are such fools.
1895		Argus (Melbourne) 5 Dec. 5/2: It appeared that [the plaintiff] had a particular fancy for a [certain] horse, and in an evil hour induced [the defendant] to lay him a wager about this animal at the long odds of two shillings to threepence. When the horse had romped triumphantly home and [the plaintiff] went to collect his two shillings [the defendant] accused him of having ‘taken him down,’ stigmatised him as a thief and a robber, and further remarked that [the plaintiff] had the telegram announcing the result of the race in his pocket when the wager was made, and in short refused to give [the plaintiff] anything but a black eye.
1901		Alec Hurley [perf. ] ‘’E’s Takin’ a Mean Advantage’ 🎵 Cos ’e’s took me down, fairly done me brown.
1901		‘Punter Bill’ ‘Clibborn’s Crooked Crew’ in Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 10 Apr. 1/6: All the take-down talent met there [i.e. Radwick racecourse] , Every one seemed spankin new,.
1902		‘Banjo’ Paterson ‘A Walgett Episode’ Rio Grande’s Last Race (1904) 42: The iron law of the country town, /Which is — that the stranger has got to shout: /‘If he will not shout we must take him down.’.
1905		Kalgoorlie West. Argus 14 Mar. 26/1: Complaints were made of the acused [...] trying to ‘take down’ men in the hotels with ‘double-headed’ pennies and loaded dice.
1908		Sporting Times 4 July 1/3: Ever since one o’ these smart blokes took me down for three blow at last ’Arpenden I’ve never gone racin’ without a pea o’ me own.
1910		L. Esson Woman Tamer in Ballades of Old Bohemia (1980) 66: We’re all taking the mugs down. One bloke, he says, does the trick with a silk hat on the Stock Exchange, and a shyster mine. We do it with a jemmy.
1915		F. Garrett diary 20 Dec. 🌐 The nigs quite deserved it [i.e a beating]. They try to take down at every opportunity and charge exorbitant prices.
1915		Drew & Evans Grifter 6: [A] man like himself, from the country, too. None of your take-down city men.
1924		G.H. Lawson Dict. of Aus. Words And Terms 🌐 TAKE DOWN — To defraud.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 26: What they took down is tips to waiters here.
1930		Williamstown Chron. (Vic.) 6 Dec. 52/1: Old Baitum was a real old take-down [...] He took my old mother down for two hundred quid.
1941		K. Tennant Battlers 72: I was cheated, of course. Not that I blame the man. [...] I was a mug, and mugs are made to be taken down.
1951		Cusack & James Come in Spinner (1960) 329: What with the Yanks blewing their cheques and the home-front Aussies takin’ ’em down, you’d think you was back with the Froggies in the last war.
1959		J. Gosling Ghost Squad 97: She [i.e. a shoplifter] must have taken that store down for a small fortune.
1964		J.A. Lee Shiner Slattery 32: Taking down a recalcitrant runholder was better than taking down a publican.
1984		B. Ellem Doing Time 24: When I first come in I was conned a lot, I suppose I was a real sucker, a square head, and the other crims took me down for what they could.
1989		A. Vachss Hard Candy (1990) 61: I remembered taking down a drunk in an alley.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 70: You taking down the Fat Man?
1997		E. Little Another Day in Paradise 72: Remember when I took those guys from New York down for all that coke?
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 156: They said you tried to take down a dice game.
1919		Gibson & Blackmore [perf. Fred Gibson & George Blackmore] ‘Billy Evergreen’ 🎵 They think as I’m a silly and they try to take me down, / [...] / They’ll find that Billy Evergreen ’as fairly done ’em brown.

4. to destroy, to dispose of.

1892		H. Lawson ‘In a Dry Season’ in Roderick (1972) 81: Presently he opened his mouth and took down the liar in about three minutes.
1924		P. Marks Plastic Age 227: He did not get drunk, but he was taking down more high-balls than were good for him.
1939		H. Miller Tropic of Capricorn (1964) 18: It was an excellent opportunity, I gathered, for Mr. Clancy, the general manager, to take down a certain Mr. Burns who [...] was evidently getting lazy on the job.
1973		Bernstein & Woodward All the President’s Men 300: Martha yells at him all day long that he ought to take every damn one of them down, including Nixon.
1999		T. Dorsey Florida Roadkill 138: The incident was featured in an article in Business World when it took down the entire ad agency.
2001		Observer 15 Apr. 13: We need to take this fucking city down!
2007		N. ‘Razor’ Smith Raiders 236: The drug operation was taken down by Dutch police.
2019		D. Winslow Border [ebook] If we help take the cartel down, we destoy the Pax Sinaloa.

5. (US Und./police) to arrest; thus as n., an arrest.

1943		W.R. Burnett Nobody Lives for Ever 173: ‘Windy gets so sore he belts his girl friend [...] and knocks her out [...] Well, before she goes out she yells bloody murder and somebody calls a cop and Windy’s taken down’.
1949		W.R. Burnett Asphalt Jungle in Four Novels (1984) 218: Throw that crooked-eared bastard in the wagon. We’re taking him down.
1952		Helen Humes ‘They Raided the Joint’ 🎵 They raided the joint, took everybody down but me.
1954		(con. 1920s–30s) J.O. Killens Youngblood (1956) 523: ‘Don’t lose no more time with these biggedy niggers, Lieutenant,’ another officer of the law said. ‘Take all of them down.’.
1967		L. Bruce Essential Lenny Bruce 245: I’m gonna hafta take you down.
1981		J. Wambaugh Glitter Dome (1982) 185: If this black Bentley leads to the dink, all I want is to be there when you take him down.
1997		G. Sikes 8 Ball Chicks (1998) 196: You don’t know how big this is. You ain’t taking me down for this.
2003		P. Cornwell Blow Fly (2004) 115: She shot and killed two drug dealers in a takedown that went bad.
2009		L. McIlvanney All the Colours 32: Maitland’s soldiers [...] I’d seen them taken down, cuffed hands held aloft.
2010		Codella and Bennett Alphaville (2011) 352: We would be taking down enough dealers to fill a major league baseball roster.
2013		K. Sampson Killing Pool 115: Cue baddies being taken off and taken down.
2021		T. Pluck Boy from County Hell 80: ‘Blood-lusty freaks that the law would rather take down than you’.

6. (US prison) to have homosexual sexual intercourse.

1969

B. Jackson Thief’s Primer 174: He got caught taking that punk down one day. It cost him his job, his good time; they put him in the shitter.

7. (US) to earn.

1969

L. Schecter Jocks 268: [P]layers like Wilt Chamberlain take down 200,000 dollars a year.