Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. UK prison, also roll) a handmade cigarette of papers and tobacco.

1950		P. Tempest Lag’s Lex. 181: A ‘good’ roll-up is one that has a reasonable amount of tobacco in it.
1958		F. Norman Bang To Rights 187: Luckily I had managed to save a few roll-ups and a few split matches.
1967		M. Braly On the Yard (2002) 342: He took a cigarette and offered the pack to Red, who snapped his roll away to accept the tailor-made.
1978		S. Longstreet Straw Boss (1979) 372: It’s just as well I give up the Havanas. I’ll be smoking one-handed rolls in Atlanta.
1983		A. Payne ‘Willesden Suite’ Minder [TV script] 2: A damp roll-up on his lower lip.
1996		P. Howard The Joy (2015) [ebook] They’re after giving him a roll-up and telling him it’s a joint.
1998		G. Burn Happy Like Murderers 273: She had been making roll-ups for her father [...] for years.
2003		N. Griffiths Stump 24: I light the roll-up an look around the shack.
2012		D. O’Donnell Locked Ward (2013) 149: [He] stood [...] in a corner of the yard and smoked his roll-ups.
2017		A. Parks Bloody January 2: He took a roll-up out his baccy tin and lit up.
2020		A. Parks Bobby March Will Live Forever 30: [E]very one of them, boy or girl, seemed to be smoking a roll-up.

2. (N.Z. teen) an illicit smoke.

1984

cited in DNZE (1998).

3. a hand-rolled marijuana/tobacco cigarette.

1992

in R. Graef Living Dangerously 169: Now they kids do rollups, smoke reefers.