Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK Und.) a cheat or swindler.

1577		Nottingham Records IV 173: For against thys Fayre evere noughte rooke wyll come [OED].
1599		Jonson Every Man Out of his Humour II ii: He? that rook That painted jay, with such a deal of outside.
1607		G. Wilkins Miseries of an Enforced Marriage Act II: Now let me number how many rooks I have half-undone already this term by the first return: four by dice, six by being bound with me, and ten by queans: of which some be courtiers, some country gentlemen, and some citizens’ sons.
1623		Dekker Welsh Embassador II i: You might putt her away in game, some younge rooke would snap at hir.
1637		‘Round, Boys, Indeed’ in Rollins Pepysian Garland (1922) 446: The shirking rooke and base decoy [...] Our company shall not inioy.
1641		Milton Ref. touching Church Discipline in England Works III (1851) 50: The Butcherly execution of Tormentors, Rooks and Rakeshames sold to lucre.
1660		‘A Dialogue betwixt Tom & Dick’ Rump Poems and Songs (1662) II 188: Your City blades are cunning Rooks.
1672		Wycherley Love in a Wood III i: I dare no more venture myself with her alone, than a Culley that has been bit, dares venture himself in a Tavern, with an old Rook.
1676		Etherege Man of Mode V i: You have an indifferent stock of reputation left. Lose it all like a frank gamester on the square, ’twill then be time enough to turn rook and cheat it up again on a good substantial bubble.
1679		Behn Feign’d Curtizans 51: And now, like gaming Rooks, unwilling to give o’er till you have hook’d in my last stake, my Body too, you cozen me with Honesty.
1680		M. Stevenson Wits Paraphras’d 23: I am shun’d by Rook and Bully, / For yielding to so mean a Cully.
1699		N. Ward London Spy XIII 323: As busie at Chuck-Farthing and Hustle-Cap, as so many Rooks at a Gaming Ordinary.
1709		‘Phoebe Crackenthorpe’ Female Tatler (1992) (17) 42: Lawyers are dispers’d with the rooks.
1714		T. Lucas Lives of the Gamesters (1930) 187: Rooks are grown of late so intolerably rude and insolent.
1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: Rook c. a Cheat, a Knave.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1740		R. North Examen 141: A new Invention called Chocolate-Houses, for the benefit of Rooks and Cullies of Quality, where Gaming is added to all the rest, and the Summons of Whores seldom fails.
1751		Smollett Peregrine Pickle (1964) 572: After the other had disengaged himself from the old rooks.
1771		Foote Maid of Bath in Works (1799) II 200: The gaming fools are doves, the knaves are rooks.
1784		J. O’Keeffe Fontainebleau in Dramatic Works (1798) II 206: Let rooks and pidgeons mingle, For if to me they bring the chink.
1793		Sporting Mag. Nov. III 96/2: You will [...] have the pleasure of being estimated by [...] the blacklegs, rooks, and shakebags, as a complete knowing one.
1800		Sporting Mag. Oct. XVII 41/2: Such is the scene, till Winter’s chilly looks / Drive away Ladies, Nobles, Pigeons, Rooks.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1821		‘An Amateur’ Real Life in London I 245: Any man indeed who dabbles in horse-dealing, must, like a gamester, be either a rook or a pigeon† [† Rooks and Pigeons are frequenters of gaming-houses; the former signifying the successful adventurer, and the latter the unfortunate dupe].
1831		Satirist (London) 25 Sept. 198/1: Daily [...] are the ‘Rooks’ to be seen congregating in corners, and canvassing what brother ‘Leg’ is [...] to writhe under the uncompromising lash of the Satirist.
1857		‘Leary Man’ in ‘Ducange Anglicus’ Vulgar Tongue (1857) 42: The fakement conn’d by knowing rooks / Must be well known to you.
1869		Gent.’s Mag. July 231: No opportunity for pigeon-plucking is lost by the majority of [billiard] markers... still he is not the worst form of rook [F&H].
1873		‘Cuthbert Bede’ Little Mr. Bouncer 18: Blucher Boots is a regular rook. He’d bet with his own grandmother [...] and would cheat her out of every penny.
1874		M. Clarke Term of His Natural Life (1897) 214: ‘Fast’ society, where animals turn into birds, where a wolf becomes a rook, and a lamb a pigeon.
1884		H. Smart Post to Finish I 5: The pigeon of early days was now transformed into the unmistakeable rook.
1895		C. Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 67: Rook, a tricky gambler.
1896		E. Pugh Man of Straw 133: D’you think I’m a man to be imposed on by a bully rook?
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 6 May 10/2: [headline] Railway Rooks. Take-Down by Train.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 1 Oct. 14/3: ‘Seen ’im duckin’ fr’m th’ district with 10 minnits start,’ ’e wuz told be a bloke in leggin’s. ‘I’d ’ave rapped th’ rook raw,’ ’e said.
1919		Aussie (France) 13 Apr. 4/2: ‘I’ll bet you two hundred francs she’s a professional rook, anyhow,’ said Joe.
1920		B. Cronin Timber Wolves 39: I ain’t no rook, but I got my living to make, ain’t I?
1921		Mencken letter 15 Dec. in Riggio Dreiser-Mencken Letters II (1986) 422: Rook!
1959		D. Niland Big Smoke 11: Santa Claus is a rook, and the saints don’t get about down here any longer.
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 330: rook. To cheat or swindle, from the same word as a noun, a cheater or swindler.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 146: cardsharps were also known as rooks, a term that lives on in phrases such as that used-car dealer rooked me.

2. (UK Und.) a small crow bar [pun; a reverse of nature, where the rook is larger than the crow].

c.1786		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions n.p.: Rook [...] also the Canting name for a Crow used for House breaking.
1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (2nd, 3rd edn).
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		H. Smith Gale Middleton 1 148: My fib [...] is loaded at the end with blue pigeon, so that it’s as heavy as a rook!

3. a clergyman [the black clothes or, according to Hotten (1864) f. the nursery rhyme ‘Who Killed Cock Robin?’, ‘I, says the Rook, / With my little book, / I’ll be the parson’.].

1832		Satirist (London) 18 Nov. 373/4: ‘Why are the clergy of the establishment called rooks?’ [...] ‘Because they are birds of prey’.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.

4. a swindle; anywhere, e.g. a card-game, a casino, deigned to fleece gullible players.

1913		Sport (Adelaide) 25 Oct. 8/1: They Say [...] That if he goes to the Sunday rooks, he’ll never arrive at the [Melbourne] Cup .
1934		B. Appel Brain Guy (1937) 71: It was a rook, arranged before he got there.