tool n.1
1. as a lit. or fig. bodily organ (primarily the penis) [sense 1c from sense 1a on model of prick n. (3)].
(a) the penis.
 | (trans.) Erasmus Praise of Folie (1509) 22: [T]he goddes aboue maie now muche franklier, and at more libertee plaie theyr pageauntes [...] For (Lord) the sporte that Priapus the great tooled god maketh them? | |
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | De Vera Obedientia A7: These hungrye whore hunters [i.e. Catholic priests] spare neyther pye wenche nor beggar by the waye but w‘ their fyerie sowderynge tooles they seale them to the surgeons hands. | |
| ‘The New Exchange’ in Merry Songs and Ballads (1897) V 4: Here’s childrens bables, and mens tooles, / To play with for delight, / And here’s round heads when they turn every way / At length will stand upright. | |
| Henry VIII V iv: Is this Moorfields to muster in? or have we some strange Indian with the great tool come to court, the women so besiege us? | |
| Fool would be a Favourite 7: ‘Every trades man will preserve his tools.’ ‘Or else his wife will Chide him when he comes home.’. | |
| The Ladies’ Parliament n.p.: Stamford she is for the game, / She saies her husband is to blame, / For her part she loves a foole, / If he hath a good toole . | |
| ‘Room for a Jovial Tinker’ in Roxburghe Ballads (1893) VII:1 75: ‘Set up thy tools, Tinker,’ quoth she, ‘and see there be none lost, / And mend my Kettle handsomely, what ere it doth me cost.’. | |
| ‘Last Instructions to a Painter’ in Aitken Poems and Satires II (1892) 20: Hast thou marked how antique masters limn [...] Sketching in shady smoke prodigious tools? | |
| ‘A Dream’ in Works (1999) 285: I had a Tool before me, which I put / Up to the quick, and strait the Oyster shut. | |
| ‘Man in the Moon’ British Museum Additional Mss 34362.49v: It was his sacred function To thrust a great T— In his Lordshipps Arse And give him the Extreame Unction. | |
| ‘Call to the Guard’ in Dryden Miscellaneous Poems (1716) 103: With trusty Pike and Gun, and the other rusty Tool. | |
| (trans.) Gargantua and Pantagruel (1927) II Bk IV 235: Several coated quails, and laced mutton, waggishly singing: [...] ‘tools without their hafts are useless lumber.’. | |
| ‘A Lusty Young Smith’ in Merry Songs and Ballads (1897) I 175: Her Husband she said could scarce raise up his Hammer, / His strength and his Tools were worn out long ago. | |
| Quackery Unmask’d 14: A worn-out Tool, ... not bigger than one’s Finger. | |
![[Scot]](/static/img/flags/sco.png "Scotland") | Order of the Beggar's Benison and Merryland (1892) 69: In April, fools neglect their tools / When ladies most adore us. | |
| ‘Dialogue btwn Captain Low & his Friend Dick’ Poems (1752) 257: But who will stickle for the Tool? | |
| Hist. of Jack Horner 17: She laid one hand upon his tool. | |
| Burlesque Homer (3rd edn) 188: And with his tool the goddess enter’d. | |
| Nunnery Amusements 15: A tender virgin spare; / To drive thus strong, your cruel tool forbear. | |
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | ‘What a Beau Your Granny was’ Luke Caffrey’s Gost 3: This little quain, with love inflam’d / After we had a chearful glass; / She laugh’d to see a tool so tame, / Saying, what a Beau your Granny was. | |
| ‘Will Ye Na, Can Ye Na, Let Me Be’ Merry Muses of Caledonia (1965) 136: ‘And noble tools,’ quo’ she, ‘by my faith!’ And ay she waggit it wantonlie. | |
| Lex. Balatronicum n.p.: Tools. The private parts of a man. | |
| Bugger’s Alphabet in (1979) 43: U is the usher of a young maiden’s school [...] And V is the virgin who played with his tool. | |
| ‘Wry-Mouth Bob & His Jolly Red Nob’ Cuckold’s Nest 45: So wry-mouth Bob, for doing a job / For the fair sex, was well known. / How their leather he beat, with a tool so sweet, / And they relished his large lap-stone. | |
| ‘The Ladies’ Tool!’ Nobby Songster 12: But now that I have learnt a move or two, / I’m quite the ladies’ tool. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Satirist & Sporting Chron. (Sydney) 25 Feb. 2/1: If therry wanted to Roger us nobly, why not [...] bring us into Court where we could have the benefit of Law [...] but no, he sends his tool to the lower court, where it is handled with much dexterity. | |
| Peeping Tom 1 2/2: [U]nless you prefer [...] having your tools cut off and thrown to the dogs. | |
| Rosa Fielding 68: [H]er guardian had only been doing his duty in displaying his jolly tool, and attempting to roger her. | |
| Pearl 1 July 5: Her face was crimson to the roots of her hair, as her hand grasped my tool. | |
| Sins of the Cities of the Plain 15: I pointed the splendid tool outwards [...] and frigged him. | |
| in Blatchford Memoirs (1983) 25: He had placed the head of his tool into the hole between her legs. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Town-Bull 84: One rounded leg came out below her dress and made my tool sharpen itself for work. | |
| More Forbidden Fruit 17: Sending my delighted tool chock up the entrance of her womb. | |
| Bawdy N.Y. State MS. n.p.: While his tool was playing with a nine inch sweep / Backward and forward as fast as a sheep. | |
| in Letter from My Father (1978) 46: I undid my pants and showed her my tool. | |
| Ulysses 292: There’s one thing it hasn’t a deterrant effect on, says Alf. – What’s that? says Joe. – The poor bugger’s tool that’s being hanged. | |
| ‘Rangy Lil’ in (1979) 191: He laid his tool on Murphy’s bar / And I swear it stretched from thar-to-thar. | |
| Anecdota Americana 2nd Ser. 84: The judge has the man take down his pants, and is shown a truly enormous penis. ‘Why, that’s the biggest tool I ever saw,’ he says. | |
| Aus. Vulgarisms [t/s] 14: weapon: The penis. [Hand-written MS addition: also tool]. | |
| Among You Taking Notes 4 Mar. 190: The 1st class ladies waiting room at Dumfries largely pencilled with semi-obscene drawings and rhymes, with much use of the words fuck and tool. | |
![[Can]](/static/img/flags/can.png "Canada") | Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1964) 80: A girl couldn’t, anyway, she didn’t have a tool. | |
| Limericks 16: He sat on a stool / And took out his tool. | |
| letter 2 Oct. in Leader (2000) 652: Well, the bacon’s no part of a porker: / It’s smoked foreskin of mule, / While the liver’s goat’s tool, / And the kidneys? The balls of old Lorca. | |
![[SA]](/static/img/flags/sa.png "South Africa") | The Park and Other Stories (1983) 21: Yer gotta sister at Motta Siena’ s yard? Motta Siena doan worry colour of de tool wat screw her girls. Long yer gotta money, yer get on toppa her girls. | |
| Decadence in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 13: I didn’t just hold prefects’ tools. | |
| (con. 1959) Up the Cross 38: ‘It [i.e. a racehorse] leaves the friggin’ barrier like a pea [sic] out of a coon’s tool’. | |
| Sweet La-La Land (1999) 157: ‘Why’d she laugh at him?’ ‘Because he had a small tool.’. | |
| Call of the Weird (2006) 121: Dildos called ‘Big Tool.’. | |
| (con. 1943) Irish Fandango [ebook] [Y]oung fellers over in Spain who copped it in the neck because you couldn’t keep ya tool to yourself’. | |
| Dly News (NY) 6 Aug. 23/3: He texted his tool [...] Taking smarmy selfies of his sex pistol and sending them to colleagues. | |
| Joe Country [ebook] ‘I’ve a tool of my own to knock her round with’. | |
| Boy from County Hell 61: ‘Roy tried to put my hand on his tool’. |
(b) a stupid, useless, socially inept person .
| (trans.) Martiall his Epigrams III No. 63 27: What sayst? is this thy pretty man? this tool? He then that’s pretty’s but a fribling fool. | |
| Crack upon Crack 1: That Dissembling Tool who Nick-names himself Trueman, though indeed the meerest Crack-fart in the World. | |
| Dispensary iii 31: Fools were promoted to the Council-Board, Tools to the Bench, and Bullies to the Sword . | |
| Vindication of H. Sacheverell title page: Intended chiefly to expose the Iniquity of the Faction in general, without taking any considerable Notice of their poor mad Tool B----t in particular. | |
| (trans.) Erasmus’ Colloquies 159: This worthy Tool of mine, that is so sparing toward his Wife, lavishly squanders away the Portion I brought along with me. | |
| Harlot’s Progress 37: One stamps, then bites his Nails, and grins, / [...] / But that he’s bar’d from being a Fool, / And to Bauds, Pimps, and Whores, a Tool. | |
| Letter from a Friend in Jamaica 9: This gained the poor Tool intirely, and he was ready from that time to receive any Impression Mr. F-- would give him. | |
| Duenna II iv: Oh, the easy blockhead! what a tool I have made of him! | |
| ‘Billy’s Too Young to Drive Us’ Collection of Songs (1788) 15: Tho’ at speech he’s a bit of a dab, / In the state he’s a bit of a tool, Sir! | |
| Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Tool. The instrument of any person or faction, a cat’s paw. | |
| Democracy Unveiled 143: A sorry sort of tool, / Who can’t write English if he dies, / Will, doubtless, turn out wondrous wise! | |
| Rob Roy (1883) 138: ‘There he goes for a troublesome mischief-making tool,’ said Miss Vernon, as she gave a glance after him. | |
| Satirist (London) 25 Nov. 381/3: A cuckold, a tool, a minster’s fool. | |
| Mr Sprouts, His Opinions 136: They was poor tools at applause. | |
| Two Men of Sandy Bar 22: Tricked, fooled, like a child! and through means of this treacherous, drunken tool. | |
| London Life 24 May 6/1: [F]olks are such fools, / To be made easy tools. | |
| Proc. Old Bailey 28 May 651: [He] stated that he took the house in good faith, and had been made a tool of if the property did not belong to Benje. | |
| ‘More Stanford Expressions’ in AS VII:6 437: A ‘tool’ is a boy who is not desirable. | |
| Harvard Crimson 18 Oct. 🌐 The articles vary from a serious appraisal of the Ivy League education to a less high-minded account of the social life of Harvard ‘wonkies’ and their Princeton and Yale counterparts, ‘ayools’ [sic: presumed mis-scan] and ‘weenies.’. | |
| et al. CUSS 211: Tool A person without much social or academic ability. Any undesirable person. | |
| Animal House [film script] What a tool. | |
| College Sl. Dict. 🌐 tool [Purdue] someone who is used and abused [...] [SUNY – S.B.] someone you pick up, use, and put back when you’re done. | |
| et al. Wayne’s World II [film script] I solemnly promise not to be a tool! | |
| PS, I Scored the Bridesmaids 232: All you really need to know about him is that he’s a tool. | |
| Mad mag. Nov. 20: This is a tool shed. perfect place for a tool like you. | |
| Thrill City [ebook] ‘Rod Thurlow,’ I lied. ‘That tool’. | |
| (con. 1980s) Skagboys 379: Ah think he’s a complete fuckin tool. | |
| ‘The Break’ in Crime Factory: Hard Labour [ebook] What a tool. [...] If Matt hadn’t already hit someone tonight, he might have done something really dumb and clobbered the tall smartarse. | |
| On the Bro’d 19: Some tool with a tricked-out Escalade, a total poser ride. | |
| Out of Bounds (2017) 321: ‘He was a tool, take it from me’. | |
| Rules of Revelation 54: ‘What a tool,’ Mel said. | |
| Back to the Dirt 24: ‘Goddamned tool, Kimball, you’s told no more holding out on customers’. |
(c) the vagina.
| Crafty Barber of Debtford in Williams Dict. Sexual Lang. II 1402: He accounts it all but merriment to catch his Wife by th’ Tool. | |
| A great & famous scoldling-match 6: At last he met with Joan i’th Dark / Who took him for a Wealthy Spark, But having tried each others Tools, / They parted Moneyless, and Fools. |
(d) a dildo.
| Spy on Mother Midnight II 7: I am done with the damn’d tool [...] whereas it is well known, that five Parts of ten of our young and old Ladies are oblig'd to the Turner for what Comfort they have in that Way. |
2. in senses of that which is used [SE tool, an instrument of manual operation, ult. ON tol, to prepare or make].
(a) an unskilful workman; usu. as dull tool, poor tool.
| Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Slug, a drone, or dull Tool. | |
| Bride of Abydos canto II line 301: Such still to guilt just Alla sends Slaves – tools – accomplices – no friends! | |
| , | | Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. |
| Sl. Dict. |
(b) a whip.
| Morn. Advertiser (London) 5 Dec. 1/3: [A]n empty coach, the mad woman; the whip, a tool . | |
| ‘Some Road Slang Terms’ in Malet Annals of the Road 393: 3. Of a Coach Tool...Whip. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. |
(c) (UK Und.) a small boy who is put through a window that is too small for the adult members of that gang to enter and who then opens the door to admit them.
| , , | | Sl. Dict. |
(d) (UK/US Und.) that member of the pickpocket team who does the actual stealing; the wire n.2
| Ragged School Mag. Dec. 294: I was sometimes the ‘tool,’ and sometimes the ‘stall’ or ‘nark’. Our profession was ‘moll tulers (or ladies’ pickpockets) . | |
| Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 62/1: The rest of the ‘stalls’ [were] there waiting for the appearance of the ‘wire’ [...] they were getting uneasy at the absence of their ‘tool’ and began drinking, smoking and reading the morning papers. | |
| Thirty Years a Detective 38: The man who does the actual stealing is called the ‘tool’ [...] The ‘tool’ usually carries a coat upon his arm for the purpose of covering his hand; with his concealed hand he will work under the man’s [victim] coat. | |
| Powers That Prey 77: He was a better ‘tool’ than ‘stall.’. | |
| Dly Press (Newport News, VA) 19 Apr. 12/3: If the [...] ‘rock’ can’t be removed from the fingers, the man [...] who is always known as ‘the instrument’ or ‘the tool’ will quit. | |
| New Age 19 Mar. 631: All these he would carry with him so that he, the ‘worker,’ or the ‘tool,’ might have his mind and his hands freed for the masterstroke. | |
| Jackson Dly News (MS) 1 Apr. 7/1: Crook Chatter [...] ‘There’s plenty of “sucker pokes” if they’re “flockin” for a good “tool”’. | |
| Keys to Crookdom 42: One of these men, the most skilled, is called a ‘wire’ or ‘tool,’ and it is he who actually ‘lifts’ the ‘poke’ of the victim. | |
| Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 189: Tool.– A pickpocket, especially the one who does the actual work of lifting the valuables, assisted by his ‘stall.’ The word is sometimes applied to the accomplice who takes the loot from the wire so that in case of a search that individual will be able to claim ignorance of any crime. | |
| (con. 1905–25) Professional Thief (1956) 45: The third operation is to put the duke (hand) down and extract the poke (pocketbook). The person who does this is known as the hook, wire, tool, or instrument. | |
| Big Con 160: He started as a pickpocket and had quite a reputation as a ‘tool.’. | |
| Headless Lady (1987) 46: The gun who does the actual picking of the pocket is called a wire, a tool, or hook. | |
| Men of the Und. 325: Tool, A pickpocket, usually the thief who removes the victim’s wallet or jewelry. | |
| World’s Toughest Prison 821: tool – A pickpocket. |
(e) (also toolie) a weapon, usu. a gun, knife or razor.
| (con. 1737–9) Rookwood (1857) 168: See how he flashes his sticks! — those are the tools to rake a three-decker. | |
| Englishman in Kansas 43: Yes, sir, this yere tool of mine [handling a pistol] it isn’t the first time it has seen a Blue-Belly. | |
| Deadwood Dick in Beadle’s Half Dime Library I:1 83/2: Better that you should take the matter into your own hands and face the music, than to employ tools. | |
| Buffalo Bill 16: ‘Jump for your tools, boys; mine’s handy! Gals, lay down out o’ range’. | |
| Robbery Under Arms (1922) 255: I’m as good a man as you are with this little tool. | |
| Squatter’s Dream 157: He possessed himself of the ‘sixteen-shooter’, and handed the Snider to the Doctor. [...] We’ll be a match for all the blessed traps between here and Sydney with these here tools. | |
| God Sends Sun. 33: Tom had de consumption, but dat ain’t never stopped him from carrying his tool [...] Tom sho would shoot. | |
| ‘Pearls Are a Nuisance’ Spanish Blood (1946) 129: I don’t need no tools to handle that bunch. | |
| Fings I i: There used to be tools / Flashing around. | |
| Among Thieves 172: You have any tools on you? | |
| Smack Man (1991) 19: His puppy was the long-barrel .45, also called a yeng, a gong, or a tool. | |
| in World According to Breslin (1985) 62: ‘You need a tool to protect you’. | |
| West in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 106: [It] does excite old johnny law to exercise his tool on us. | |
| Curvy Lovebox 20: The tool must’ve appeared like from nowhere right under his nostril. | |
![[NZ]](/static/img/flags/nz.png "New Zealand") | ‘Boob Jargon’ in NZEJ 13 36: tool n. 1. Knife. 2. Firearm. | |
| Layer Cake 186: I’m panicking and sniffing the chamber of the tool. | |
| Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 191/1: tool n. any type of weapon, e.g. a knife, firearm, etc. | |
| Times Rev. 30 Apr. 23/1: If your friend wants to start trouble, I have got my tool [knife] on me and I will use it to open him up. | |
| Viva La Madness 124: ‘Do we have tools here, Sonny?’ [...] ‘In the attic, bruv’. | |
| ‘Trapping’s Alive’ 🎵 Home visits with the tools dem / And show a man about home improvement. | |
| ‘Let Em Know’ 🎵 This for my niggas in the trenches with the four way / Still sleepin’ with the toolie by the doorway. | |
| Blood Miracles : A tool worth twelve-hundred euro. |
(f) a burglar’s implement, spec. a jemmy.
| Autobiog. of a Gipsey 411: In pursuance of this plan he was to return to his lodgings in Bloomsbury to pick up his ‘tools.’. | |
| Gonif 87: They operate all over these parts. They got the fences, the tools, the cons. | |
| Signs of Crime 205: Tool A jemmy. | |
| Lowspeak. |
(g) (US campus, also power tool) a very hard worker.
| et al. CUSS 211: Tool A person who studies a great deal. | |
| What’s The Good Word? 78: Students [...] have taken to calling more serious students a variety of new terms [...] ‘tool’ (or ‘power tool’ if especially bookish) at Bowdoin. | |
| Campus Sl. Apr. 5: tool [...] Also power tool, someone who acts extremely nerdy. |
(h) (US drugs) a hypodermic syringe.
| Corner (1998) 3: Mr Blue himself [...] pocketing two bills from each, though it’s two more if you need a fresh tool. |
In compounds
(US und.) a p[ickpocket who only targets men.
| Buffalo Courier (NY) 8 Sept. 67/3: Pickpockets that work upon men only are called ‘bloke-tools’. |
1. the vagina.
| 5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases. | |
| Maledicta VI:1+2 (Summer/Winter) 132: Vagina […] toolbox. |
2. (also toolshed) a group of idiots, or just a very extreme idiot.
| Online Sl. Dict. 🌐 toolbox n 1. someone who is an extreme ‘tool’. Note: etymology suggests that they are not just one ‘tool’, but rather an entire set. (‘That guy is such a toolbox.’) 2. a group of ‘tools’. (‘Yeah, like I would go to their toolbox party.’). | |
| Campus Sl. 6 Apr. n.p.: tool – very unhip male; toolshed – someone with unfavorable characteristics: Danny, quit following us, you toolshed. |
3. (N.Z. prison) the control room, guard room [‘where the screws are found’].
| Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] : . |
the vagina.
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 161: Instrument, m. [...] 2. The female pudendum; ‘the tool-chest.’. |
(US campus) a fool, an idiot.
| ‘Razorback Sl.’ in AS L:1/2 68: tool-head n Person regarded as stupid or simple-minded. |
(Irish) a urinal.
| All Looks Yellow to the Jaundiced Eye 54: He heads straight for the only occupied stall in the tool house. |
1. a lock-picker; one who deals with alarms etc.
| After You with the Pistol (1991) 332: Every [...] professional team of thieves has a [...] ‘toolman’ who knows how to neutralize burglar-alarm systems and to open locks. |
2. (US) a safe-breaker.
| Asphalt Jungle in Four Novels (1984) 148: We need an expert toolman. |
3. a gun-carrying robber.
| Sun. Times News Rev. 12 Mar. 1: I was with the tool-men and blaggers (gun-carriers and armed robbers). |
(UK Und.) one who carries and uses a knife.
| A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun 75: I was getting a reputation as a ‘tool-merchant’, which was no bad thing when every second kid on the manor was secreting a blade somewhere on his person. |
see toolbox
In phrases
(US) to be foolish or crazy.
| Custody 289: ‘Sure. Call the pig and narc on myself. You must have broken tools in your garage,’ she sneered. |
(UK Und.) a tool used for committing a burglary.
| Banker Tells All 137: The tools we use in a burglary we call lawful tools; we call them unlawful when they are too long or when they make a noise. |
to arm oneself [‘towel’ apparently transcription of Dublin accent].
| X 25 Nov. 🌐 Before the violent scenes in Dublin on Thursday a man left this voice message on an anti-immigration WhatsApp group: ‘At 7 o’clock be in town. Everybody bally up, towel up, any fucking gyppo, foreigner, anyone, just kill them. |
SE in slang uses
In phrases
unintelligent, stupid.
| Roger’s Profanisaurus in Viz 98 Oct. 26: spannern. Not the sharpest tool in the shed. A right fuckwit. | |
| ‘Jack Rabbit Slim’s Cellar’ in Pulp Ink [ebook] Hank said that [...] you ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed. | |
| Killing Pool 144: I know you’ve never been a Good Cop. But you’ve never been the sharpest tool in the shed either. | |
| Adventures of the Honey Badger [ebook] Dopey Bastard [...] He’s not the sharpest tool in the shed but he makes up the numbers. |