wife, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

wife n.

[in senses of ‘locking up’ her husband]

1. a fetter fixed to one leg.

1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1869		Australiasian (Melbourne) 17 July 8/5: [A] handcuff is a snitcher; a fetter attached to one leg is termed a wife.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1927		in ‘Jargon of the Und.’ in DN V.
1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 195: Wife.– The ball and chain used to prevent escape from a road or ‘chain’ gang.

2. (US campus) one’s roommate.

1929		Phila. Inquirer 16 June n.p.: The roommate, in the newest slang, is still ‘the wife.’.
1932		‘Patois of Annapolis’ in Sheboygan (WI) Press 17 Sept. 8/3: If a middy shares his room with a comrade, the latter is known as the ‘wife,’ while if the room is shared with several all are known as ‘bigamists.’.

3. the supposedly subservient, ‘female’ partner in a gay couple.

1898		P. Norroy Art of Child-Love 101: Aas Helen and I slept together we played at a game [...] called ‘Husband and wife’ making and finally submitting to the most criminal assaults in each other’s virtue.
1912		Horsham Times (Vic.) 19 July 10/2: The annals of fiction do not contain a more extraordinary romance than that of these two girls, who loved one another so much that in order to be together one put on man’s clothes and lived and worked as a man, while the other posed as ‘his’ wife.
1919		Transcript Foster Inq. in L.R. Murphy Perverts by Official Order (1989) 11: Brunelle referred to Billy Hughes (called ‘Salome’) as his wife, claimed he was ‘screwing him’ nearly every night.
1922		Fred Fisher ‘Chicago’ in Newton (1972) 🎵 Unless they change the laws, they’ll never keep it from being gay. / I had the time, the time of my life, / I found a guy who had another guy for his wife. / Well, where else, but in Chicago.
1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 195: WIFE.– [...] A boy travelling with an older tramp, so called since there is often a homosexual relationship between them.
1932		Arrow (Sydney) 8 Jan. 5/1: Lesbianism is the term applied to intercourse between two women, one being aggressive, and acting the role of a ‘husband,’ the other being the ‘wife’ .
1940		‘Digg Mee’ ‘Observation Post’ in N.Y. Age 7 Sept. 10/4: I later learned that the ‘wife’ he lost was a man.
1954		M. Bodenheim My Life and Loves in Greenwich Village (1961) 58: He is married to a handsome young man [...] Having assumed the role of ‘wife’ in a marital relationship that is quite common in Bohemia.
1968		E. Cleaver Soul on Ice 47: I told him that he was good for nothing but to be somebody’s jailhouse wife and he laughed.
1968		K. Brasselle Cannibals 14: Bryan Westgate and his ‘wife’ John?
1971		R.D. Pharr S.R.O. (1998) 17: How come all the real faggots [...] had good wives or steady boy freinds while we so-called normal men lived in one dreary hotel room after another?
1981		H. Gould Fort Apache, The Bronx 79: José’s his jailhouse wife.
1983		N. Heard House of Slammers 10: Playing wife to some dude who could convince them that he was the one to look out for them.
1994		T. Willocks Green River Rising 21: Agry’s wife, Claudine [had] undergone another involuntary change of gender and, as plain Claude, was sweating it out.
1997		(ref. to 1985) S.A. Hay Ed Bullins 133: He poses brilliant questions in the first draft of Snickers (1985) [...] The teacher rejects Animal’s overture and his Snickers candy bar. He later savagely beats up Animal for having raped his ‘jailhouse wife .’.
2003		K. Cage Gayle 103/2: wife n. lover – used mainly by older gay men to refer to their partner (Let me just phone the wife and see what she says).
2016		Mother Jones July/Aug. 🌐 You are the only same sex person in my life. So you have to never worry about anyone taking your place, not even a female...Sweetie, you are a good wife.

4. (US black/UK Und.) a pimp’s favoured prostitute, or one of a group working for a pimp.

1935		T. Yates ‘Harlem on My Mind’ in Afro-American (Baltimore, MD) 2 Mar. 9/4: When fellers like Frisco Yates [...] stay home (and keep house) and their ‘wives’ make the rounds — it’s Harlem at its best (uh, huh!).
1938		F.D. Sharpe Sharpe of the Flying Squad 123: Soon after the murder of French Fifi [...] he said to me: ‘One of my wives has been bumped off.’ I said that I was glad I was never one of his wives.
1973		D. Schultz (ed.) Pimp 7: These women, my wives, are doin’ what they’re doin’ because they want to.
1977		J.L. Dillard Lex. Black Eng. 88: The whores plus the pimp are a ‘family,’ and of course, the prostitutes may be called wives or old ladies.

5. (US gang) the steady girlfriend of a gang member.

1949		H. Ellson Duke vii: Wife – girl friend.
1956		H. Ellson ‘Dangerous’ in Tell Them Nothing (1956) 50: Yeah, all my wives fight over me.
1997		G. Sikes 8 Ball Chicks (1998) 107: Some were, of course, the steady girlfriends, or ‘wives’ of gang members.

6. (US campus) a regular girlfriend.

1989		P. Munro Sl. U.
1993		B. Moore Lex. of Cadet Lang. 428: wife, (the) a girlfriend with whom a cadet has a ‘very close’ or ‘long-standing’ relationship.
2003		A.N. LeBlanc Random Family 3: Their main girls, the steady ones they referred to as wives.
2021		Central Cee ‘Loading’ 🎵 It’s time that I find me a wife.

7. (N.Z. prison) a prisoner who ‘works for’ another, running errands, etc.

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 203/2: wife n. = girlfriend.

In derivatives

wifed (adj.)

(US campus) faithful to a given female partner to the exclusion of one’s social life.

2016

C. Eble (ed.) UNC-CH Campus Sl. Spring 2016 11: WIFED — devoted to one’s girlfriend to the exclusion of friends: ‘John hasn’t been the same since he met Rachel. He’s so wifed’.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

wife-basher (n.) (also wife-beater)

(Aus.) any average-to-poor quality mass produced lager beer; in Australia, Emu Bitter or Emu Export.

2002		Google Groups:misc.immigration.australia+nz 2 Oct. 🌐 Emu Export, AKA ‘wife basher’.
2004		In the Mix 15 Dec. 🌐 I remember tasting that Thirsty Dog beer in QLD years ago... now that was a shit beer. Good if you were a uni student though, cheap as shit. It is all schooies of wife basher for me these days.
2005		Google Groups:rec.travel.europe 7 Mar. 🌐 This is a man who has never drunk a Maas, or a Jupiler [...] OK, Belgian wifebeater is better than UK wifebeater, but it’s still PWL.
2008		Wikpedia: Victoria Bitter 14 May 🌐 In South Australia [Victoria Bitter] is sometimes referred to as ‘Old Wifebeater’ - a reference to VB’s working-class appeal in Victoria and elsewhere.
2011		Perth Street Bikes 23 Mar. 🌐 Please, go back to the start of the thread. This isn’t a ‘Recommend me a yuppie wanker beer’ thread. This is a ‘Recommend me a cheap but drinkable bogan wifebeater’ thread. If it’s over $40 a carton it has no place here.

wife-beater (n.) [the association of such singlets with men who are prone to domestic violence]

1. (US) a sleeveless t-shirt; also attrib.

1994		A. Adolfsen 6 Apr. 🌐 Here’s more of Jackie Beat’s tips on how to handle a cop boyfriend: Do wear b[a]ggy chinos, a ribbed wife-beater undershirt, an unbuttoned K-Mart flannel and a bandanna to bed.
1999		J. Ridley Love Is a Racket 382: The guy behind the registration counter — fat, unshaved, with a dirty wife-beater T-shirt — mumbled ‘Ten’ at me.
2004		A. Mansbach ‘Crown Heist’ in Brooklyn Noir 132: He was rocking black basketball shorts, a white wife-beater, and some dirty-ass sweatsocks.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 45: Eddie Vento, wearing a white wife-beater and light blue boxer underwear.
2013		Eve. Standard (London) 18 July 15/1: A smart pair of shorts and a pinstriped wife-beater.
2015		L. McInerney Glorious Heresies 253: [A]n enormous man in a wifebeater.
2017		T. Spicer Good Girl Stripped Bare 50: ‘Hey, luv. Feel like going for a roll,’ asks a guy wearing a ‘wife beater’.
2019		N. Walker Cherry 310: [H]e was wearing JNCOs and a wifebeater and a cowboy hat and was skinny.
2020		(con. 1991-94) W. Boyle City of Margins 124: ‘He’s on his book jacket in a wife-beater with his arms crossed’.
2023		A. Nette Orphan Road 153: [W]earing track suit pants and a blue wifebeater singlet.
[2024		J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 463: He wore a wife-beater’s singlet and collected snakes].

2. (also wife-basher) Stella Artois lager.

2000		Google Groups:alt.sports.spurs 17 Dec. 🌐 [blog] My particular tipple is Stella Artois. At 5.2% it is not that weak a lager. [reply] Aaah. Nothing like a pint of wifebeater, eh?
2008		J. Niven Kill Your Friends (2009) 51: ‘Any more for any more?’ [...] ‘Wifebeater,’ say I. ‘Rockschool,’ say the other two. Trellick gets the Stella and the Jack and Cokes in.
2009		iSteve 21 June 🌐 Tellingly, the popular Belgium beer Stella Artois is nicknamed ‘wifebasher’ among working class Brits.
2010		http://brawlinthefamily.keenspot.com 15 July 🌐 he just sat down opposite me and pulled out a can of wife beaters [...] what he did then was down the can of stella, in about 3 seconds [...] and pour equal measures, of gin and vodka in it.
2011		D.D. Brazill ‘Lady and the Gimp’ in Pulp Ink [ebook] I [...] popped into Costcutter for a can of wife beater.
2013		East Dulwich Forum 26 Apr. 🌐 In the pub I drink real beer at home the old wifebasher at 5.2% does the trick. [footnote] note Stella in the supermarkets is weaker 4.8 so therefore tastes crap like all weak lagers (well, let’s be honest almost all lagers).
2017		Google Groups:alt.folklore.computers 13 Dec. 🌐 Sadly, ‘Stella Artois’ is a best seller, here. Nicknamed ‘wifebeater’ because of the sorts of people who drink it and what they do once they have.

3. see wife-basher

wife-in-law (n.) (also in-law)

(US black) any woman in a pimp’s group of prostitutes, other than his favourite and thus most privileged woman.

1963		in T.I. Rubin Sweet Daddy 86: She wasn’t even one of my chicks [...] She was no in-law. [Ibid.] 95: She got ideas. Didn’t like her in-laws.
1969		‘Iceberg Slim’ Pimp 273: Keeping her wife-in-laws and my scratch straight [...] was the first acid test for Rachel as a bottom woman.
1972		Hall & Adelman Gentleman of Leisure 142: I didn’t understand why – with seven wives-in-law – I was in jail for six days.
1976		R. Decker Patterns of Exposition 168: Top woman in this ‘family’ – the pimp’s favorite, who brings in the most money — is called his ‘wife.’ The rest are known as ‘wife-in-laws.’.

In phrases

wife’s best friend (n.)

see under best friend n.

wife’s dream (n.)

(Aus.) a racing tip, the inference is of its unlikeliness.

1900

Bulletin (Sydney) 15 Sept. 24/1: A prominent Melb. Mo. put on latter part of ‘commish,’ though first lots [...] were secured at hundreds to one, two or three on the strength of an alleged ‘wife’s dream.’.

wife-starver (n.)

(Aus.) a man who defaults on his maintenance payments.

1968		J. Alard He who Shoots Last 129: Ya sees, da queers is all penned up together, same as da wife-starvers.
1990		Tupper & Wortley Aus. Prison Sl. Gloss. 🌐 Cunt starver. The sentence served by a male maintenance defaulter (now obsolete). Also ‘wife starver.’.
2000–02		Macquarie Dict. 🌐 wife-starver adjective Prison a person convicted for neglecting maintenance payments. Compare cunt-starver.

wife in watercolours (n.) [the image of colours fading as do the passions of the newly married or the idea that the loving (if essentially hired) mistress was less strident than an intolerant harridan of a wife. Watercolours, suggests Grose 1785, are, like mistresses, ‘easily effaced, or dissolved’]

a mistress.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: wife in water colours a mistress, or concubine, water colours being, like their engagements, easily effaced or dissolved.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1862		E. de la Bédollière Londres et les Anglais 318/2: wife in water colours, maîtresse avec laquelle on vit maritalement.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

wife out of Westminster (n.)

see under Westminster n.