snatch n.
1. in sexual contexts.
(a) sexual intercourse, esp. quick or illicit or with a prostitute.
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Comedye Concernyng Three Lawes (1550) Act IV: Yea, poore marryed men, haue very much a do, I counte hym wysest, that can take a snatche and to go. | |
| Quip for an Upstart Courtier E2: What bawdrie is it he will not suffer for he may haue mony and good chere, if he like the wench wel a snatch himselfe for they knowe all the whores in a country. | |
| Anatomy of Melancholy (1850) 558: I could not abide marriage, but as a rambler [...] I took a snatch where I could get it; nay more, I railed at marriage downright. | |
| Eng. Moor IV iv: If I do chance to clap your Barbary buttock / In all her bravery, and get a snatch / In an odd corner, or the dark. | |
| (con. 1940s) Dark Sea Running 119: ‘Let’s get some snatch,’ he said. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Pimp 114: I hope my double hasn’t put the muscle on this broad for some ‘snatch’. | |
| Airtight Willie and Me 13: I don’t dig no bought snatch. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 180: Hot pants here’s after a bit of stray snatch. | |
| I, Fatty 42: All actresses are snatch-peddlers. | |
| On the Bro’d 45: ‘It’s like totally clutch for me to take him out and just drown him in snatch’. |
(b) (also snatch-block, snatchbox) the vagina [negative image].
 | Covent Garden Jester 19: ‘Last night, in the dark, I run’d my nose into that there snatch, sir,’ replied the tailor, pointing towards Lucy, ‘’twas that caulked up my daylights, sir.’ [...] ‘Damn the scoundrel,’ whispered I to Lapboard, ‘If I had him ashore I’d learn the villain to say he run his nose into my daughter’s snatch.’. | |
| ‘We Men Such Funny Things Have Got’ Frisky Vocalist 11: And if we’re game, / When we take aim, / Why, into Miss Snatch we tumble! | |
| Peeping Tom (London) 30 120/2: [a toast] ‘The well-greased rope that easily goes into the snatch-block’. | |
| in Jrnl Hist. Sexuality (July 2002) 445: [He was] cracking jokes from the Dingy’s [sic] stern sheets on ‘sailors’ knives and whores’ snatches’. | |
| ‘Experiences of a Cunt Philosopher’ in Randiana 108: Her lovely rosebud of a snatchbox. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| ‘In the Black Berry Patch’ in Bawdy N.Y. State MS. n.p.: When he offered me a quarter to look at my snatch. | |
| Nocturnal Meeting 21: ‘The odour of man [...] is just as enticing to a randy woman as the scent of her snatch to her lover’. | |
| Anecdota Americana I 10: Ef dat ain’t de mos’ considerinist wife. Look at dat boy; sends me a hair right off ’er snatch. Hot dawg! | |
| (ref. to 1868) Amer. Madam (1981) 76: She could pick up coins the guests put on the edge of a table with her snatch. | |
| Man with the Golden Arm 48: In yer mother-in-law’s icebox it’s a schooner! [...] Yer mother-in-law’s snatch! | |
| ‘Howl’ Howl and Other Poems 12: Who sweetened the snatches of a million girls. | |
| Last Exit to Brooklyn 58: Rosie [...] ran back to the kitchen when Harry lunged for her snatch. | |
| (con. 1960s) Wanderers 105: The girl would have to stand on her head, and he would have to lower himself into her snatch. | |
| West in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 113: Some getting their oats before their time / by dint of threat / in lonely fields / dragged their by snatch-crazed fiends. | |
| (con. early 1950s) L.A. Confidential 178: A female mannequin covered by a tarp – plasterboard, rubber lips, glued on pubic hair, a snatch made from a garden hose. | |
| White Shoes 196: He felt like sinking one of the R.M. Williams in the next white shoette’s snatch. | |
| ‘The Cooter Monologues’ at www.pinkhairedgirl.com 20 Jan. 🌐 Snatch. Snatch just sounds horribly vulgar. Especially the phrase ‘bleeding snatch.’. | |
| Intractable [ebook] She took her panties off. I took my strides off. I put my willy into her snatch and that’s all there was to it. | |
| Hilliker Curse 9: She flashed her snatch at him at some movie-biz party. | |
![[Scot]](/static/img/flags/sco.png "Scotland") | Decent Ride 33: Ah’d huv had that fuckin tube up baith thair snatches and been suckin like a double-teaming Calton Hill bustie till ah tasted claret. | |
| Word Is Bone [ebook] ‘You the reason I went back to snatch, Junie. Men like you and Spanky. You all make a fag see something special about pussy’. |
(c) a woman.
| Mess Songs and Rhymes of the RAAF 1939-1945 5: Abdul did ride with some snatch by his side, / His face was all flushed with desire. | |
| From Here to Eternity (1998) 656: You must of really line yourself up quite a deal with that snatch down town. | |
| (con. WWII) Deathmakers 194: If I hadn’t promised my old lady I wouldn’t knock over any other snatch, I’d sure as hell find out tonight what a golden lay is like. | |
| Snatches and Lays (1973) 72: The ram he fetched made our arseholes stretch / Like an old gin’s snatch when you squeeze 'er, / My penmate strained with his shirt all stained / And his arse went off like a greener. | |
| Down These Mean Streets (1970) 186–7: We downed a bottle and picked up a couple of octoroon snatch. | |
| Close Quarters (1987) 84: If this picture-taking snatch wants to be an asshole and work the bushes for us [...] she can be my fucking guest. | |
| Rat on Fire (1982) 91: That snatch that’d fuck a flashlight if there was nothing else handy. | |
| Robbers (2001) 190: First snatch looks your way, you bust up the deal. | |
| Rough Riders 218: Joe’s got himelf some nice snatch there, huh? | |
| Back to the Dirt 242: [F]ucking some snatch in the lab. |
(d) a collective term for women in general, as viewed as the route to sexual intercourse; also attrib.
| et al. DAUL 200/1: Snatch, n. [...] 5. (Coll.) Loose women. | |
| Cat Man 241: A couple of girls in the late teens were kneeling picking bouquets [...] ‘What of it?’ Chief demanded, hardly willing to whisper. ‘We got ourselves some snatch!’. | |
| Last Exit to Brooklyn 12: Cruise around in a load like that [...] and you haveta beat the snatch off witha club. | |
| in Psychotic Reactions (1988) 33: Your poor average kid, cruisin’ addled down the street in vague pursuit of snatch or reds. | |
| After Hours 44: I never hassle over stray snatch. | |
| West in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 105: You were seduced by snatch. | |
| Rivethead (1992) 147: When can we expect an in-depth article on the proper method of jumpin’ factory snatch? | |
| (con. 1972) What It Was 192: ‘I don’t want no monkeys,’ said Fanella. ‘Don’t worry [...] they got white snatch down there too’. | |
| On the Bro’d 56: The snatch selection was terrific. |
(e) (US prison) a male homosexual.
| et al. DAUL 200/1: Snatch, n. [...] 5. (Coll.) [...] degenerates. |
(f) (US gay) the anus.
| et al. DAUL 200/1: Snatch, n. [...] 6. (P) The buttocks. | |
| Queens’ Vernacular. |
(g) (US campus) a notably ugly woman.
| Rent Boy 85: ‘He was out with this heavy fucking snatch – ’ ‘Ratty hair? Bleach blond?’. |
(h) AIDS.
| POZ Jan. 🌐 Slang for HIV: ‘The cat flu,’ ‘She’s got snatch’ (gay). |
2. an arrest.
| View of Society II 71: The Body-Snatchers happened to get intellligence where he was [...] slapped him on the shoulder, informed him that he was a prisoner, and in that manner compleated his Snatch. | |
| Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. (2nd edn). | |
| et al. DAUL 200/1: Snatch, n. [...] 4. Seizure in the commission of a crime; arrest. |
3. (UK/US Und.) a robbery, a victim ripe for robbing.
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | Wkly Freeman’s Jrnl 20 Dec. 7/6: After I was chucked up I did a snatch near St Paul’s, was collared, lagged and got this bit of seven stretch. | |
| Golden Spike 94: A lone woman appeared. Angel alerted immediately. ‘A snatch!’ he said. ‘Look how she swings that pocketbook. You take her, I’ll cover.’. | |
| (con. 1934) A Stone for Danny Fisher 93: Don’t grab no junk; only stuff we can sell. [...] As soon as you made your snatch, blow. | |
| Gonif 80: The snatch on Ludwig’s attic had whetted my appetite for this kind of pilfering. | |
| Spike Island (1981) 201: We ’ad this fella who was doin’ all the snatches off the old ladies. |
4. (orig. US, also snatcheroo) a kidnapping.
| implied in on the snatch | |
| High Sierra in Four Novels (1984) 416: Johnny wouldn’t even listen when somebody talked about a snatch. | |
| ‘Cooked!’ Dan Turner - Hollywood Detective Jan. 🌐 Lola hired me to put the snatcheroo on you; to keep you here until morning. | |
| Benny Muscles In (2004) 236: A snatch? An old-fashioned abduction? | |
| (con. 1958) Been Down So Long (1972) 16: You know what, Heff? The Virgin Mary-Mother dug the whole snatch. | |
| Boston Blitz (1974) 38: I don’t like the idea of bum-rapping a snatch. | |
| (con. early 1950s) L.A. Confidential 470: It placed the kid somewhere else at the time of the Wennerholm snatch. | |
| Fever Kill 118: They didn’t know it was a snatch at first. They thought she might’ve just wandered away. | |
| (con. 1962) Enchanters 9: ‘It’s a put-up job.’ The snatch played unkosher. |
5. attrib. use of sense 4, pertaining to kidnapping.
| ‘Snatch Bait’ in Ten Detective Aces Oct. 🌐 Sergeant Brunt used human bait to hook the snatch mobsters. |
6. (US black) a fight.
| Hell to Pay 6: What about that snatch we did with that boy’s dog over on Crittenden? |
Pertaining to the vagina
In compounds
a womanizer.
| East in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 69: She had this short skirt on – and it had tucked gently between her legs in case she flashed her magic snare to some snatch bandit like me. |
the vagina.
| (trans.) Gargantua and Pantagruel (1927) II Bk V 622: pan.: Let us know how you victual the venereal camp. How is the snatchblade? fri.: Rough. [...] pan.: How is the gate-way? fri.: Free. pan.: And how is it within? fri.: Deep. pan.: I mean, what weather is it there? fri.: Hot. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Snowdrops from a Curate’s Garden 22: Her well-worn snatch-blatch could receive no gratification from anything smaller than a village pump-handle. |
the vagina.
| ‘I’d Be A Little Flea!’ in Cockchafer 18: I’d be a little flea, born in a bed-room, [...] I’d make the lady’s snatch-box my bower. | |
| ‘Sally May’ in Nancy Dawson’s Cabinet of Songs 7: She’s slap up, she’s divine, / But her snatch-box is another’s, / It can never be mine. | |
| Randiana 108: I clapped my hand upon her lovely rosebud of a snatchbox. | |
| Sl. and Its Analogues. |
a sexual obsessive.
| Widespread Panic 39: ‘Alan Ladd?’ ‘Dramatically underhung snatch hound’. |
a tampon.
| Roger’s Profanisaurus in Viz 87 Dec. n.p.: snatch mouse n. Tampon. |
(US und.) a kidnapper.
| (con. 1962) Enchanters 8: Stein said there were three more snatch men still out there. |
(US black) a house, a home.
| Really the Blues 219: I’m gonna breeze to my personal snatchpad. |
(US black) sexual activity.
| Sound 113: They were introduced to an insignificant, graying man — ‘on the Jersey side of the snatch play’. | |
| Ladies and Gentlemen – Lenny Bruce! 196: Hipster talk [...] A man over forty, for example, was said to be ‘on the Jersey side of the snatch play’. |
the penis.
| Get Your Cock Out 35: The evil snatch-salami thrashed around in his leathers like a great-white, hungry for cooze. |
a close-up photograph of the naked vagina.
| Hungry Debutante n.p.: [I]f he got real lucky he might get a snatch shot of the Carlson girl. | |
| Lucky You 49: Shiner would dissect the magazines and arrange his favourite snatch shots across the Plexiglas lid of the ice-cream freezer. | |
| Eleven Karens n.p.: Movie star and former Miss Pennsylvania, whose career was launched by the riveting snatch shot in the 1992 hit Basic Instinct. |
(US black) the WWII draft board.
| N.Y. Amsterdam Star-News 13 Mar. 13: [M]y snatch spread flew me a slight kite on the early brights [...] Ole man, I’m brought down. |
the female pubic hair.
| Shoot the Movie Star 156: My head is a whirlygig of jiggling bubs and freckled fannies and red snatch-thatches . | |
| Confessions of a Private Dick 42: Mrs Brown [...] draws up one of her legs so that I cop an eyeful of snatch thatch. | |
| Maledicta IV:2 (Winter) 187: There is a small family of names for the snatch-thatch based upon the tax imposed upon English playing cards in the day of Queen Anne. |
In phrases
to reveal one’s genitals.
| ‘Nix My Jolly Gals Poke Away’ in Gentleman’s Spicey Songster 16: No gal who ever flash’d her snatch, / Could ever bring more swell coves up to the scratch. |
Pertaining to crime
In compounds
kidnapping.
| Night Club Era 259: [T]he snatch racket, as kidnaping came to be known, had developed into a popular source of income for the underworld. | |
| in Goldenberg Snatched! 30: The regular ‘Snatch’ game is an antiquated affair, and is always marked by certain characteristics. In the first place, the victim is invariably snatched without warning. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 237: snatch racket A kidnapping. | |
| Whisper in the Gloom (1959) 119: Get that! He tried to kidnap Bert Hale. He’s in the snatch racket! |
In phrases
to pickpocket.
| ‘The Street Arabs of New York’ in Appleton’s Journal (N.Y.) 4 Jan. 47: I caught the butcher-chap a-nappin’, so I slinked up and did a snatch. |
1. working as a kidnapper.
| ‘The Snatching of Bookie Bob’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 118: Harry the Horse and Spanish John [...] go on the snatch. [Ibid.] 120: Waldo calls it kidnapping, which is a title that will be very repulsive to guys who are on the snatch nowadays. |
2. working as a street robber.
| Sir, You Bastard 104: I thought you meant on the snatch. |
1. to kidnap, to seize, to take over.
| ‘The Snatching of Bookie Bob’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 122: We are going to put the snatch on Bookie Bob. | |
| ‘Daughter of Murder’ Dan Turner – Hollywood Detective Dec. 🌐 Bradley met her train at Albuquerque; drugged her and put the snatch on her. | |
| letter 27 May in Harris (1993) 50: I don’t even have a car. The Revenooers put the snatch on it in N.O. | |
| et al. DAUL 171/2: Put the snatch on. 1. To kidnap. | |
| Carlito’s Way 85: Someone put the snatch on Petey Amadeo’s kid. | |
| Hooligans (2003) 403: We’re gonna put the snatch on him. |
2. to arrest.
| et al. DAUL 171/2: Put the snatch on. [...] To arrest; to seize in the act. | |
![[Can]](/static/img/flags/can.png "Canada") | (con. 1920s) Legs 225: They’d never find the stuff where we got it planted, and if they put the snatch on any of us we’re all clean. |