Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(a) often constr. with dead, to amaze or delight, esp. an audience [note earlier SE use in 17–18C, usu. as kill one with... or kill at first sight].

1770		T. Chatterton ‘Betsy of the Hill’ in Revenge and Additional Songs (1795) 47: Her dying, soft, expressive eye, / Her elegance, must kill; / Ye Gods! how many thousands die / For Betsy of the Hill.
1833		‘The Loves of Paddy Byrne’ in Rake’s Budget in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) III 68: ‘Oh, you’re doing it, you’re doing it! / You’re killing my mutton,’ said she.
1846		Durivage & Burnham Stray Subjects (1848) 107: No boss that ever killed in York / Was happier than I. / I felt that I had done it; / And what had won her smile – / ’Twas them embroidered braces, / And that ’ere immortal tile.
1849		Paul Pry 8 Jan. 4/3: W. W—n, the infant of Bromley-street [...] not to think he is killing the barmaids at the King’s Arms.
1899		Ade Fables in Sl. (1902) 86: They [...] told their fellow-Workers in the Realm of Dramatic Art how they killed ’em in Decatur and had ’em hollerin’ in Lowell.
1902		Bulletin (Sydney) 9 Aug. 14/4: The recently-returned boys in khaki have been doing Collins street, and imagining their mustard puttees were ‘killing’ all the syrens of The Block.
1905		Sporting Times 18 Mar. 1/5: [He] had ‘killed ’em dead an’ stiff, from New York clear to Frisco’; but he couldn’t move St. James’s.
1912		Ade Knocking the Neighbors 98: He was keyed to Concert Pitch and the Audience was Piped and all the old sure-fire Bokum of a Sentimental Nature simply Killed them.
1938		J. Weidman I Can Get It For You Wholesale 50: You’re killing me. You mean to say you actually understood something I said for the first time?
1941		D. Burley N.Y. Amsterdam Star-News 21 June 13: It [i.e. a speech] knocked me out. In fact, Jackson, I was killed.
1943		P. Larkin letter 30 Sept. in Thwaite Sel. Letters (1992) 75: Freeman’s solo on that kills me – notice the way he plays each note separately as if he were a painter making strokes with a brush.
1951		J.D. Salinger Catcher in the Rye (1958) 73: She still kills everybody – everybody with any sense, anyway.
1957		H. Simmons Corner Boy 148: That’s just it, they don’t kill me.
1965		L. Bruce How to Talk Dirty 99: You’ll really do great. You’ll kill ’em.
1978		R. Price Ladies’ Man (1985) 25: I just wanna wish you the best of luck tonight. I’m sure you’re gonna kill ’em out there.
1986		B. Geldof Is That It? 135: You guys kill me.
1996		(con. 1964-65) B. Thorpe Sex and Thugs and Rock ’n’ Roll 107: ‘Time to go on [stage] [...] Let’s kill ’em’.
1999		K. Sampson Powder 166: All of this for under sixty rips in a St John Street pub. London kills you.
2000		N. Barlay Crumple Zone 73: So what’s he, your role model? — Mattafack yah. He kills me.
2000		R.G. Barrett Leaving Bondi (2013) [ebook] ‘Good on you, Ray. You’ve killed ’em’.

(b) to cause to convulse with laughter, to delight, to bowl over; esp. as that kills me; often ironic.

1881		Bulletin (Sydney) 5 Feb. 3/3: He ‘spoons’ with Tilly, ‘mashes’ Milly, / ‘Kills’ Jemima Ann; / Then off he walks, and glibly talks / ‘How girls do dote on man!’.
1896		Ade Artie (1963) 4: What kills me off is how all these dubs make their star winnin’s.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 301: And the two shawls killed with the laughing, picking his pockets the bloody fool and he spilling porter all over the bed and the two shawls screeching laughing at one another.
1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 76: The blokes outside must have been proper killing their selfs.
1957		R. Prather Always Leave ’Em Dying 144: I looked from Randy to Lyn and grinned. ‘Wouldn’t this kill you?’.
1958		(con. 1950) E. Frankel Band of Brothers 228: Kills me, Captain. All them souvenirs out there, and no way to get at ’em.
1962		R. Cook Crust on its Uppers 33: The ponces all killing themselves laughing.
1973		D. Goines Street Players 147: You pimps kill me.
1983		J. Byrell (con. 1959) Up the Cross 127: Sandy Ireland the singer killed ’em too.
1986		J.B. Keane Bodhrán Makers 304: What kills me [...] is the way they parade up and down to the altar or is it how I’m being unfair?
1997		N. Barlay Curvy Lovebox 170: You kill me man.
2001		N. Barlay Hooky Gear 51: Cant help laughin down the receiver. Trudys ma gods always kill me.
2021		T. Swerdlow Straight Dope [ebook] — Don’t worry about the meeting with DreamWorks, we’re going to kill it.

(a) (orig. US) to eat (enthusiastically) or to drink.

1833		D. Crockett Sketches and Eccentricities 145: I can kill more lickur [...] and cool out more men than any man you can find in all Kentucky.
1887		Lantern (N.O.) 20 Aug. 2: After the lady had killed a dozen [oysters].
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 11 Dec. 5/7: Sport seen Snowy L and Mick C trying to kill a pint of beer [...] What’s up, boys.
1924		‘Digit’ Confessions of a Twentieth Century Hobo 92: We killed a case of Moet et Chandon to show that we were all satisfied with the deal and the party broke up.
1933		J.T. Farrell Gas-House McGinty 224: They killed the moon they had, and stopped at Scotty’s for another bottle.
1941		B. Schulberg What Makes Sammy Run? (1992) 280: We’ll have to get together and kill a case of champagne some night.
1956		I. Shulman Good Deeds Must Be Punished 109: Many bottles were killed that night.
1965		C. Brown Manchild in the Promised Land (1969) 418: I’ll get another one [i.e. bottle of wine] right now, and we could kill it.
1972		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Whoreson 239: You want to kill a fifth with me?
1986		C. Stroud Close Pursuit (1988) 24: Every now and then you kill a glass of Johnnie Walker Black with a .357 chaser.
1996		Eble Campus Sl. Mar. 5: kill – finish entirely: ‘My roommates and I killed two large pizzas last night’.
2001		(con. 1975–6) E. Little Steel Toes 141: Kill most of a quart of bourbon and lie down to pass out.
2007		T. Dorsey Hurricane Punch 56: Coleman killed the beer and tossed the empty over his shoulder.
2012		T. Piccirilli Last Kind Words 99: I wondered how much booze he had to kill every night to help him get to sleep.
2012		E. Petulengro Caravans & Wedding Bands 22: ‘I could kill a cup of tea’.
2023		F. Bill Back to the Dirt 67: Pulled a seven- or eight-dollar bottle of Jim Beam from his back pocket. Twisted the cap off and tilted it up. Killed it.

(b) (orig. US) to suppress information, to cancel.

1865		Wilkes’ Spirit of the Times (N.Y.) 16 Dec. 256/1: Two galleys of equal length, one being marked ‘Must,’ the other ‘Kill this.’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Jan. 18/3: So I wired the [publishing] house to ‘kill’ that portrait and bury it with the engraver when the violets bloom.
1934		W.R. Burnett Goodbye to the Past 75: ‘You’ll forget all this in a little while, Charlotte. It will blow over. Charley Cross killed the newspaper account’.
1936		‘Josephine Tey’ Shilling for Candles 135: ‘I killed a story about her yesterday’.
1953		R. Chandler Long Good-Bye 116: Only you didn’t know he existed and by the time you found out the client had changed his mind and killed the investigation.
1956		E.J. Ruppelt Report on UFOs 94: Their stories were killed — they would have been an anti-climax to Keyhoe’s potboiler.
1969		L. Schecter Jocks 13: It was a [. . .] good story that had been difficult to research. But it was never printed. The executive editor of the Post, Paul Sann, killed it.
1976		in Woodward & Bernstein The Final Days 316: Dean Burch got word from the President, ‘Kill the plan’.
1985		T. Wolff ‘Desert Breakdown, 1968’ in Back in the World 143: He’d had orders to go [to Vietnam], but the orders were killed just before he left.
1994		Mollen Report 96: [S]uch a practice would be ‘tantamount to killing’ a case and concealing it from prosecutors.
2000		P. Earley Super Casino 209: Frank Fahrenkopf [...] was hired as the AGA’s executive director and ordered to kill Wolf’s bill [investigating US gambling].
2015		(con. 1919) C. Fountain Betrayal 98: [Reporters] tried to write of a possible fix in the coming weeks and months and had their stories killed.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 133: He was killing the Cochran exposé.

(c) to use up, to expend, e.g. time.

1872		J.D. McCabe Lights & Shadows 255: The evening papers [...] are bought chiefly by persons who wish to read them at home after the cares and fatigues of the day are over, or to kill time in the cars on the way home.
1932		W.R. Burnett Giant Swing 56: An owl-car was standing at the end of the Avenue A line, the crew was matching pennies, killing the few minutes left before they must start back on their long crosstown run.
1936		(con. 1920s) Dos Passos Big Money in USA (1966) 779: He felt stuffy from the movie he’d killed the afternoon in.
1945		W.R. Burnett Tomorrow’s Another Day 92: He had some time to kill, as Lonnie wanted him to wait and go back to the restaurant with him.
1953		E. Wilson Look Who’s Abroad Now 76: ‘They only have races Wednesday and Sunday. I wish they had them oftener. They’d help me kill my day’.
1974		Coward et al. Psychologist With a Gun 160: [T]hey had found another couple in the same predicament with whom they managed to kill the entire week.
1981		W.D. Myers Hoops 123: I had all day to kill.
1998		D. Jenkins Rude Behavior 75: There were a couple of hours to kill before I went to meet the coach.

(d) (orig. US) to cut the engine of a vehicle or the power on a machine.

1886		Phila. Eve. Tel. 20 Mar. n.p.: The hose was cut [...] and engines killed so that it will take days to bring them to life again.
1907		E.S. Field Six-Cylinder Courtship 9: Scared pink for fear Jimmie Redmond would appear, I lost no time in starting. What a blessing that I hadn’t killed my engine!
1955		‘Blackie’ Audett Rap Sheet 16: I handled the big switches that ‘killed’ the circuits the line crews was working on.
1966		R.E. Alter Carny Kill (1993) 127: Mike chuckled and went over to the hi-fi and killed the music.
1977		A. Brooke Last Toke 25: Redwood killed the motor.
1987		R. Campbell Alice in La-La Land (1999) 192: He killed his lights and motor, got out with soft grunts and groans.
1996		P. Temple Bad Debts (2012) [ebook] I [...] l killed the telly and fell asleep.
1997		C. Hiaasen Lucky You 212: He’d killed the engine, and they were drifting in the dark toward the island.
2000		M. Collins Keepers of Truth 113: I let it play for another fifteen seconds or so, then killed it.
2018		C. Hammer Scrublands [ebook] After that, Martin kills the box.

(e) to turn off in general, to stop, esp. of noise or talking; often as kill it

1928		C. McKay Home to Harlem 108: Then the five young white men [were] unmasked as the Vice Squad and killed the thing.
1936		D. Stivens Tramp and Other Stories 92: He wanted to kill this thing within him.
1946		K. Fearing Big Clock (2002) 158: ‘Drop it,’ I said. ‘The assignment is killed.’.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 325: Kill the chills: he’s on the reopening.
2002		‘Touré’ Portable Promised Land (ms.) 158: We Words (My Favorite Things) [...] Bring the noise. Kill that noise. Kick yo ass.

(f) to turn off lights, esp. in TV or film studios.

1928		in N.Y. Times 11 Mar. VIII 6: Kill ’em – Lights out [HDAS].
1939		R. Chandler Big Sleep 179: Kill that spot, bo.
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 278: He killed his lights. He worked in the dark.
2002		S. Maloney Something Fishy (2006) 122: I killed the lights, got out and took stock.
2023		(con. 1962) J. Ellroy Enchanters 15: I killed my lights and stepped out of the car.

(g) to finish, esp. a drink; thus killer n., a heavy drinker.

1928		R. Fisher Walls Of Jericho 30: So between them they killed the rest of the pint.
1933		N. Algren ‘So Help Me’ from Story mag. in Texas Stories (1995) 24: We got a big pint for $1.00 and [...] after we killed it we still had twenty cents left.
1937		C. Himes ‘Every Opportunity’ in Coll. Stories (1990) 249: He made the last one a triple, killing the eighty-five cents.
1940		S. Longstreet Decade 35: Here, kill this bottle.
1950		Little Miss Sharecropper ‘I Want to Rock’ 🎵 Hey baby, don’t you move, / I just killed a fifth and I’m in the groove.
1951		‘The Moral Booster’ in Banglestien’s Bar n.p.: Several other couples dropped in and we killed five cases of beer.
1960		Mad mag. July 52: He killed the contents and ended up stewed to the gills.
1969		‘Iceberg Slim’ Mama Black Widow 5: I killed the fifth of gin.
1972		O. Hawkins Ghetto Sketches 231: [of a bottle of liquor] ‘You want this corner, chu-man?’ [...] ‘Naw . . . go ’head, y’all kill it.’.
1983		S. King Christine 340: Buddy killed the bottle.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 222: The barman yelled, ‘Last call.’ Jack killed his club soda.
1997		C. Newland Scholar 119: You can kill it, I ain’t too hungry.
2000		G. Pelecanos Shame the Devil 137: Boyle killed his beer, crushed the can, and set it on the living-room table.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 207: Brice took a long swig from the beer bottle, then another, killing it.
2011		J.J. DeCeglie Drawing Dead [ebook] Chenko lit me the subsequent cigar and I killed that sucker quicker than the first one.
2019		C.D. Rosales Word Is Bone [ebook] Just before she’d kill her bottle and go to bed.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 6: I killed my sandwich.

(h) to put out a cigarette.

1942		R. Chandler High Window (1943) 135: She killed her cigarette in Morny’s copper goldfish bowl, speared the crushed stub absently with the letter opener and dropped it into the waste-basket.
1958		R. Chandler Playback 27: I [...] killed a cigarette and studied the wall heater.
1962		B. Behan Brendan Behan’s Island (1984) 147: Don’t kill that [cigarette], Billser has to get a drag out of it yet.
1977		A. Hoffman Property Of (1978) 167: McKay had to [...] hand the cigarette to me to kill in the ashtray.
1993		R. Doyle Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha 253: He killed his Major [brand of cigarette] and put it in his box and put it in his pocket.

(i) (US) to get rid of or remove an item, usu. of clothing or food.

1993		A. Adams Hollywood Madam 139: Kill the glasses, go with the hair.
2000		Observer Rev. 9 Jan. 2: Everyone had been saying he needed new material [...] so he decided to kill off his old material.
2003		lasagnafarm.com 🌐 qg: Jesus Christ, ok. What else? sg2: Kill the jacket. Are you Lemmy from Motorhead?

(j) to cover a wall or other object in graffiti.

2001		N. MacDonald Graffiti Subculture xi: Bomb, cane, destroy, kill: To completely cover something in graffiti.
2008		‘Graffiti slang’ at www.graffiti.calligraphy-mvk.ru/ 🌐 To kill – to paint out a wall, a carriage.

(a) to pass an exam, esp. well.

1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 44: kill, v. 2. To recite perfectly. 3. To do perfectly.
1906		J.W. Carr ‘Words from Northwest Arkansas’ in DN III:ii 143: kill, v. To pass an examination perfectly. ‘I killed math.’.
1967–8		Baker et al. CUSS 147: Kill [...] Kill it Do well on an exam.
1971		Current Sl. V:4.
1983		Eble Campus Sl. Mar. 4: kill – to get an A on a test.

(b) to do well, esp. easily.

1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 44: kill, v, To do easily.
1912		T.A. Dorgan Silk Hat Harry’s Divorce Suit 11 Sept. [synd. cartoon strip] I’ve just been killing this fishing stuff [...] I caught 86 trout yesterday.
1925		P. Hamilton Monday Morning (2018) 115: [H]e played leading juveniles in the provinces. He was a natural actor, and a quiet actor, quietly killing his play.
1982		Eble Campus Sl. Spring 5: kill – to do something extremely well: She killed that song.
1986		R.G. Barrett Real Thing 116: Jees you’ve killed ’em Reg, good on you.
1997		C. Newland Scholar 202: On a hot day, my man kills it spee, I’m tellin’ you.
2004		Eble Campus Sl. Apr. 7: wax – overcome an obstacle, achieve success [...] Also kill.
2007		B. Coleman Check the Technique 445: ‘So I was like: “Fuck that, I'm going first! Niggas is gonna hear me!” [Laughs.] “And I killed it”.
2012		C. Eble (ed.) UNC-CH Campus Sl. 2011.
2012		Sydney Morn. Herald 30 Jan. 🌐 ‘e’s been around while but still kills it,’ said one awestruck youth [...] the ‘it’ he still kills are the moves that have made his name reign [...] across the skate culture.
2017		T. Spicer Good Girl Stripped Bare 27: I’m killing it in class .
2024		D. Rucker Life’s Too Short 143: [of a song] Two and a half minutes of heaven. We kill it.

(c) to punch; also in fig. use, to succeed.

2004

Eble Campus Sl. Apr.

(a) (US, also have a kill) to masturbate.

1990		Tupper & Wortley Aus. Prison Sl. Gloss. 🌐 Kill. Masturbate. Thus ‘to have a kill’.
2000		Other Side of the Wall: Prisoner’s Dict. July 🌐 Kill: To masturbate, as in ‘I got a picture of my bitch in the world I kill to at night.’ (TX).

(b) (US campus) to have sexual intercourse with.

2003

Eble Campus Sl. Nov. 4: kill – engage in sexual intercourse with: Did you kill her last night?