Green’s Dictionary of Slang

see under bust n.

gloves.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Stick-flamms c. a pair of Gloves.
1708		J. Hall Memoirs (1714) 13: Stickhams, Gloves.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1809		G. Andrewes Dict. Sl. and Cant n.p.: stick-fams gloves.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1821		Flash Dict. [as cit. 1809].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict. 32: stick fans – gloves.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open [as cit. 1835].
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 86: stick-flams Gloves.

1. any sweet food, e.g. a pudding, a sweet such as toffee, that is hard to chew.

1828		Blackwood’s Edin. Mag. Feb. 233/2: Their Saturdays commons of scrap-pie and stick-jaw .
1843		R.S. Surtees Handley Cross (1854) 413: As holdin’ as a stick-jaw puddin’ at a charity school.
1853		R.S. Surtees Mr Sponge’s Sporting Tour 295: Stick-jaw (as they profanely called a certain pudding) [Ibid.] 345: The stickjaw pudding assumed a consistency that was almost incompatible with articulation.
1881		N.Z. Observer (Auckland) 29 Jan. 193/2: Sucking his thumb as if it was the most delicious ‘stick jaw’ imagineable.
1898		E. Pugh Tony Drum 18: Toffee-apples, stickjaw, Jumbo-chains, everythink, and there’s other sweets you ain’t never heard of.
1908		Sun. Times (Perth) 8 Mar. 1/1: ‘Uncle Tom’ has been ordered to preside as chairman to the stick-jaw jamboree.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘The Sweetshop Girl’ Sporting Times 5 Mar. 1/4: But one has to have a thick jaw to be always true to stickjaw.
1950		C. Harris Three-Ha’Pence to the Angel 22: Here, here’s two-pence, go and get some stickjaw.
1959		I. & P. Opie Lore and Lang. of Schoolchildren (1977) 186: Most boys call toffee ‘stick-jaw’.

2. anything seen as extremely tedious.

1923

J. Manchon Le Slang.

see separate entries.

see separate entry.

see separate entries.

see separate entry.

(US) a phr. of condemnatory dismissal.

1944		Berkshire Eve. Eagle (MA) 5/2: Dizzy Dean as a broadcaster is tickling his listeners’ ribs with this one: When a pitcher starts going haywire, either through wildness or throwing base hits, Dean chirps over the mike: ‘You can stick a fork in him folks—he’s done.’.
1984		D. Jenkins Life Its Ownself (1985) 35: You can turn me over, Dreamer. I’m done on this side.
1989		Lou Reed ‘Last Great American Whale’ 🎵 Like my painter friend Donald says, / ‘Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over, they’re done.’.
1995		J. Stahl Permanent Midnight 258: Stahl says Stick a Fork in Me — I’m Done!
2002		WorldNetDaily.com 11 Feb. 🌐 The mutually exclusive component has always been peaceful co-existence and recognition of Israel. Arafat won’t swallow that pill. Stick a fork in him. He’s done.

to eke out an impoverished life.

1890–1904

Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

to settle an argument.

1655		Fuller Church Hist. of Britain VI 268: This Quaternion of Subscribers, have stick’n the point dead with me that all antient English Monks were Benedictines.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

(orig. Can./US) to stay close by; often as imper.

1872		City I 104: He was a man that loved to stick around home as much as any cat you ever saw in your life. He used to say he’d as lief have a tooth pulled as go away anywheres.
1895–6		H. Lawson ‘Two Larrikins’ in Roderick (1972) 231: Stowsher’s goin’ to stick.
1896		F. Hutcheson Barkeep Stories 116: ‘You’re doin’ purty good to be let stick around here an’ get yer mitts in de lunch’.
1904		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 28 Sept. 3/6: ‘Did she stick?’ ‘Blast ’er, no’.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 201: And I needn’t stick?
1908		Everybody's Mag. XVIII 459: Gamblers of the turf who ‘stick around’ with the game from one year’s end to the other.
1913–14		E. O’Neill The Web in Ten ‘Lost’ Plays (1995) 67: I didn’t think he’d be fool enough to stick around here.
1915		Van Loan ‘Sporting Doctor’ in Taking the Count 39: I’ll stick for two weeks more.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 362: Better not stick here all night like a limpet.
1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 194: You stick around with me, old man, and I’ll show you a good time!
1933		C. Himes ‘Prison Mass’ in Coll. Stories (1990) 162: He just wanted her to stick until he got out of debt.
1939		J. Weidman What’s In It For Me? 300: You stick around and watch me for a while.
1940		W.R. Burnett High Sierra in Four Novels (1984) 315: When you guys get through I’ll stick and report the whole thing to the police.
1949		Wodehouse Mating Season 233: Corky said she thought she would stick on for a bit.
1953		‘William Lee’ Junkie (1966) 53: You’re bound to get some good breaks if you stick around long enough.
1961		R.S. Close With Hooves of Brass 190: ‘Will they stick, you mean?’ He looked down at her. [...] , ‘It would take more than a bush-fire to drive us off the mountains’.
1967		(con. 1920s) J. Thompson South of Heaven (1994) 166: The sheriff knows you’re stickin’ here.
1968		N. Heard Howard Street 150: You stick around long enough and you’ll dig it for yourself.
1972		Nova Apr. 97: Yeah, don’t go, Charlie, stick around and humour the madman.
1989		M. Amis London Fields 42: I’m like a vampire. I can’t enter unless I’m asked in over the threshold. Once there, though, I stick around.
1999		K. Sampson Powder 111: His sparkling eyes teasing Wheezer, challenging him to find a good reason to stick around.
2000		C. Cook Robbers (2001) 348: You gonna stick around a while?

to stay very close, lit. and fig.

1894		Truth (Sydney) 14 Jan. 6/6: Blue me you bet your sweet life I’ll stick to it like glue to a basket.
c.1943		S .J. Baker Aus. Vulgarisms [t/s] 13: stick like shit to a (wet) blanket: To adhere closely or (figuratively) to refuse to budge.
1984		Guardian 8 May 9/8: The dirty (blanket) protest are images that — in an army phrase predating the troubles — stick like shit to a blanket.
1998		Sydney Morn. Herald 27 Sept. 53/1: ‘We’ve just got to stick together like shit to a blanket’.
1998		Guardian 9 Oct. 65/4: He’s sticking to her like shit to a blanket, but in a nice kind of way.
2002		J. Cameron Hell on Hoe Street 194: We all stuck there [i.e. home] like shit to a blanket.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 128: like shit to a blanket Sticky and unpleasant.
2003		D. Hamill Long Time Gone 92: Me and your old man were as close as shit to a blanket.
2006		B. Matthews Intractable [ebook] That cop stuck to me like shit to a blanket. He wouldn’t give in.
2007		N. ‘Razor’ Smith Raiders 70: Fred was stuck to us like shit on a blanket.

to admire sexually; usu. in phr. I could stick a tail on that.

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1152/1: since ca. 1960.

a persistent, dedicated person.

1908

H.G. Wells Tono-Bungay 162: I’m a boiler-over, not a simmering stick-at-it .

to hide something or someone away; thus stuck away, hidden.

1959

B. Kops Hamlet of Stepney Green Act I: I always suspected that you had a tidy sum stuck away.

1. (Aus. Und.) to maintain silence rather than betraying one’s peers.

1978		G. Newbold ‘Social Organization of Prisons’ in dissertation U. Auckland 326: The Real Staunchie always ‘sticks fat’, he never compromises his honour to the compulsions of formal authority.
1982		G. Newbold Big Huey 73: The fact that he’d behaved like that and ‘stuck fat’ earned Trevor a lot of respect [...] irrespective of what happened, you never told a screw about it.
1993		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read How to Shoot Friends 39: I’d rather be backed up by one hated arsehole who can stick fat than a hundred popular showponies who can’t keep their mouths shut.

2. (Aus., also stich hard, stick staunch) to maintain one’s loyalty, to offer unstinting support.

2001		D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 178/1: stick fat to be absolutely loyal and supportive to one’s friend; to hold unwaveringly to one’s beliefs [...] stick hard (also stick staunch) =. stick fat.
2002		Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 14 Sept. 40: Dumped Carlton coach Wayne Brittain has told Blues players he did not regret rejecting two offers to coach other clubs. […] He told the guests how his father, who died at an early age, had told him to always ‘stick fat’. [...] ‘Both times I had an opportunity to leave this place but I’m so glad that I stuck fat with you blokes and stayed,’ Brittain said. [...] ‘I will not ever regret making those decisions of sticking fat with you guys.’.

1. see sense 2c above.

2. see stick up for v.

to play and win a toss of the dice (occas. turn of cards) to determine who pays for the next round of drinks.

1887		G. Devol Forty Years a Gambler 100: One of the planters bet me the wine that he could turn the ticket with the baby. I took him up, and he stuck me.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues VI 362/1: stick for drinks = to win the toss.

see stick it v. (1)

see stick someone for

to be unpalatable, to infuriate, to be unacceptable.

1679		H.B. Vindication of Sir Thomas Player 1/2: ’Tis the Matter, not the Manner that sticks in our Unworthy Respondents Gizzard [OED].
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: It Sticks in his Stomack, he resents it.
1738		Swift Polite Conversation 43: Well, but don’t let that stick in your Gizzard.
1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. 228: stick ‘to stick in one’s gizzard,’ to rankle in one’s heart.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1890		Bulletin (Sydney) 5 July 7/1: [T]he time-honoured fiction that two young men in muddy boots could mistake an eligible family mansion for a pub., is apt to stick in the gizzard of modern scepticism.
1901		W.S. Walker In the Blood 161: Wot sticks in my gizzard is becomin’ a landed proprietor.
1908		L. Doyle Ballygullion 43: That’s what sticks in me gizzard.
1924		C.J. Dennis ‘Termarter Sorce’ in Rose of Spadgers 29: Deceit ain’t in me bag uv tricks. / [...] / Sticks in me gizzard.

(W.I.) a form of dumpling.

1959

cited in Cassidy & LePage Dict. Jam. Eng. (1980).

see separate entry.

a thick soup.

1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 199: stick to your ribs Hearty meal usually involving a lot of meat. ANZ.

see separate entries.

the vagina.

c.1850

Peeping Tom (London) 19 80/2: ‘Where is the office, my dear? [...] The sticking office,’ said she. He answered, ‘I believe you are mistaken, the fire office is kept there’.

1. to overcharge.

1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1873		Sl. Dict.

2. see stick around

see under one n.¹

see under bib n.

to boast, to claim, to make oneself out to be.

1877		J. Greenwood Dick Temple III 13: The idea of a cove sticking hisself up because he has been birched!
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

see shove one’s oar in under shove v.

to die.

1873		Sl. Dict.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1894		Leamington Spa Courier 24 Feb. 3/3: Forms of expression [...] such as ‘shut his knife’ and ‘stick his spoon in the wall,’ as similes for death.

see sense 6 above.

see separate entries.

see separate entry.

see under solid adv.¹

1. (also stick someone in for) to take from someone, usu. but not invariably money.

1884		Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday 31 May35/3: ‘They stick you two-and-six for a cauliflower’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 24 Oct. 6/2: I’ve a wife and family, and blanked if I’m going to be stuck in for a thousand ‘quid.’ Go to some other positive colour beak.
1937		P. Cheyney Dames Don’t Care (1960) 104: After stickin’ me for two cigarettes an’ thereby provin’ that there ain’t even one Mex who will even give you some information for nothin’.

2. (also stick someone with) fig. to burden someone with something, e.g. a jail sentence.

1888		Kipling ‘“Sleipner,” late “Thurdina”’ in Civil & Military Gaz. (1909) 145: ‘It only killed poor Marish and made you stick me with the mare’.
1960		C. Cooper Jr Scene (1996) 209: Ain’t you through with me yet? You stuck me for three years already.
1967		(con. 1920s) J. Thompson South of Heaven (1994) 146: We figured to kill him and stick you for it.
1981		M. Baker Nam (1982) 219: These motherfuckers tell me, ‘You got off too easy,’ and they stick me with more time.

3. (also stick someone with) to make someone pay a bill; to borrow money without repaying it.

1910		Bulletin (Sydney) 15 Dec. 39/4: But Oi’ll pull through ahl roight, an’ thin watch me shtick th’ dahm rag f’r damages.
1914		R. Lardner ‘My Roomy’ in Coll. Short Stories (1941) 345: I guess he’d stuck me for the most — about seventy bucks.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 697: If only I had a ring with the stone for my mouth a nice aquamarine Ill stick him for one and a gold bracelet.
1923		Wodehouse Inimitable Jeeves 199: I’m afraid I’ll have to stick you for the passage money.
1947		J. Archibald ‘When a Body Meets a Body’ in Popular Detective Sept. 🌐 You come back here, Willie! [...] You ain’t stickin’ me with no check, you—!
1957		‘Ed Lacy’ Lead With Your Left (1958) 124: I might as well see Uncle Frank and stick him for lunch, save some dough.
1968		(con. c.1900) J. Thompson King Blood (1989) 73: He stuck me for almost twenty dollars worth of drinks.
1977		(con. 1949) J.G. Dunne True Confessions (1979) 163: Lois Fazenda had skipped three weeks before, sticking her [...] roommates with her share of the month’s rent.
1992		P. McCabe Butcher Boy (1993) 16: They must have thought I was going to stick them for a few bob tax as well.

1. to burden with, to trick someone into accepting.

1877

Five Years’ Penal Servitude 275: He had [...] ‘stuck’ both jewellers and pawnbrokers with them [i.e. fake jewels] all over the country.

2. to make responsible for a usu. unpleasant responsibility or something unpleasant, e.g. a faulty computer.

1955		Mad mag. 15: No matter what kind of crummy team those guys behind the scenes stick him with.
2000		B. Wiprud Sleep with the Fishes 147: That Bifulco was a sharp cookie, sticking him with that carp.

see under dick n.¹

see separate entry.

1. see sense 1a above.

2. see separate entries.

see separate entry.

see separate entry.

1. wait! hold it!

1718

C. Hitchin Regulator.

2. (also stick a pin in that! stick a pin here!) note carefully! bear in mind!

1836		Public Ledger (Phila.) 1 Nov. n.p.: Why does money become scarce? Because the bankers cannot discount, says the merchant. Stick a pin there [DA].
1837		Champion (London) 22 Jan. 5/5: He called them the rascally Radicals’ of Newcastle. Stick a pin there, ‘rascally Radicals’!
1849		Chelmsford Chron. (Essex) 5 Jan. 4/2: I know the men [...] and know what they state to be a fact — so stick a pin there. I know ten other men who worked [...] so stick another pin there.
1859		Dundee Courier 20 Apr. 4/5: True as preaching. Our business folks ‘can stick a pin in there’.
1861		Knickerbocker (N.Y.) LVIII 266: Name for name, there are two of the Norman in New-England for one in the South. Stick a pin there—not that it’s of any account, but the Chivalry insist on it [DA].
1867		Glasgow Herald 1 Oct. 4/2: 556 pincushions [...] to enable the senators to brush up their ideas and to ‘stick a pin there’.
1871		Bucks Herald 1 Apr. 3/5: We have heard ministers, who thought they had said a good thing in their sermon, tell their audience to ‘stick a pin there,’ or to ‘put that in their pipes and smoke it’.
1931		O. Strange Law O’ The Lariat 159: Masters is cashed – yu can stick a pin in that.
1948		Daily Oklahoman 7 June 8/1: It might be a good thing for the voters to stick a pin here and remember a thing or two on next election day [DA].

put your hands up! a robber’s trad. order to their victim to raise their hands above their head.

1930		E.H. Lavine Third Degree (1931) 80: The detectives rashly dashed in, yelling to the hold-up men to ‘stick ’em up’.
1944		J.T. Farrell ‘A Teamster’s Payday’ in To Whom It May Concern 66: All right, expressman, stick ’em up.
1956		J. Curtis Look Long Upon a Monkey 73: All right, fellows! Stick ’em up!
1989		Beano Comic Library No. 174 31: Stick ’em up! I want the ball.
1996		R. Doyle Woman Who Walked Into Doors 161: What did they yell at him? Stop? Halt? Stick’m up?

see separate entry.

excl. of agreement, encouragement.

1874

‘Old Calabar’ Won in a Canter I 20: ‘Stick on, I rather think I can [i.e. win a race]’.

see fuck that/this for a game of soldiers! under fuck v.

a general excl. of farewell.

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1153/2: [...] later C.20.