leaf, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

leaf n.

1. (US Und.) autumn.

1859

Matsell Vocabulum 50: leaf Autumn. ‘I will be out in the leaf,’ I will be out in the autumn.

2. (US) in drug uses [the plants from which they are taken] .

(a) (also leaf-gum) crude opium; also attrib.

1919		‘Sax Rohmer’ Dope 138: Opening the canvas wrappings, the man began to take out and place upon the counter a number of reddish balls of ‘leaf’ opium, varying in weight from about eight ounces to a pound or more.
1938		in D. Maurer ‘Lang. of the Und. Narcotic Addict’ Pt 2 in Lang. Und. (1981).

(b) drugs in general.

1938		D. Maurer ‘Lang. of the Und. Narcotic Addict’ Pt 2 in Lang. Und. (1981).
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1953		Anslinger & Tompkins Traffic In Narcotics 312: leaf. Drugs.

1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 143: leaf Narcotics.
1959		J.E. Schmidt Narcotics Lingo and Lore.
1971		E.E. Landy Underground Dict. (1972).
2001		ONDCP Street Terms 14: Leaf — Cocaine; Marijuana.

(d) marijuana.

1961		R. Russell Sound 17: It’s a cryin’ shame they outlawed the leaf.
1979		H. Feldman et al. Angel Dust 125: In Tacoma they smoke (alone or with some ‘leaf’) or swallow it.
1986		in Wilson & Arnold Street Kids 52: Grass is too expensive [...] It’s one hundred a deal if you want head and seventy for leaf.
1990		R.G. Barratt ‘Kill Two Birds’ in What Do You Reckon (1997) [ebook] [A] plastic bag with about half-a-dozen foils in it. A few lousy grams of crappy leaf.
1999		Dr Dre ‘Still D.R.E.’ 🎵 Dr. Dre is the name, I’m ahead of my game / Still, puffing my leafs, still with the beats.
2001		Daily Tel. (London) 30 Jan. n.p.: May I interest you in some [...] bud, leaf, Marley, pachalolo? [...] Still not with me? How about some skunk, righteous bush or, let’s be perfectly clear, marijuana?

3. (US) as a currency note.

(a) a $100 bill.

1929		M. Bodenheim Sixty Seconds 237: If a hall is closed you can bet your last leaf it was because it wouldn’t pay enough.
1931		W.N. Burns One-Way Ride 32: He squandered ‘leaves,’ which were $100 bills.
1940		H. Asbury Gangs of Chicago (2002) 340: Hundred-dollar bills were leaves, and twenty-five dollars was scornfully called two bits.

(b) a $1 bill.

1929		M.A. Gill Und. Sl.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1951		Cusack & James Come in Spinner (1960) 138: I’ve spent all the leaves I could in Sydney taking you round and now you’re going to let me go back to the States without so much as a real cuddle.
1973		C. Himes ‘Baby Sister’ [screenplay] in Black on Black 103: Dirty money is piled on the table. The stick man counts it. STICK MAN: Nine leaves in the circle.

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 106/1: leaf n. 3 a cheque rendered invalid due to lack of sufficient funds, a false cheque.

4. see tea leaf n. (1), tealeaf v.

SE in slang uses

In phrases

drop one’s leaf (v.) [autumnal imagery, but note go off with the fall of the leaf ]

to die.

1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Drop one’s leaf To die ; very poetic, obviously allusive to the falling of the leaves in autumn.
1923		J. Manchon Le Slang.

fall of the leaf (n.) [autumnal imagery, but note next]

death.

c.1707		‘Rise Bonny Kate’ in Farmer Merry Songs and Ballads (1897) IV 199: The Bully too drinks to wash off his Disease, / Still fearing the Fall of the Leaf.
1719		in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy I 313: [as cit. c.1707].

go off with the fall of the leaf (n.) (also go off at the fall of the leaf, die at the fall of the leaf) [a pun on the leaves or hinged panels of the drop and the dead leaves that fall from a natural, rather than judicial ‘tree’; see cit. 1785; Griffiths, Chronicles of Newgate (1884), notes that the adoption of the gallows in England followed the invention of the Dublin ‘engine of death’; note George Parker Life’s Painter (1789): ‘Fall of the leaf. The new mode of hanging. The culprit is brought ; out upon a stage, and placed upon a leaf, when the rope is fixed about his neck the leaf falls, and the body immediately becomes pendant’; thus n. falling leaf, execution by hanging]

to be hanged.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Leaf, to go off with the fall of the leaf, to be hanged; criminals hanged in Dublin, being turned off from the outside of the prison by the falling of a board, propped up, and moving on a hinge, like the leaf of a table, (Irish).
c.1786		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions n.p.: Leaf. To go off at the fall of the Leaf, to be Hanged by the New Contrivance, where by the falling of a leaf or Platform the Patients are left Suspended in the Air .
1789		G. Parker Life’s Painter 138: He went off at the fall of the leaf, at tuck ’em fair — he died d—d hard, and was as bad as brass.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue [as cit. 1785].
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict. 169: leaf the drop on which executions take place, which are defined as the ‘fall of the leaf’ by the ribald spectators.
1884		A. Griffiths Chronicles of Newgate 423: The old vulgar ‘chaff’, ‘Take care, or you’ll die at the fall of the leaf’.
1891		Tuapeka Times (Otago, NZ) 12 Aug. 6/4: A hanging is called ‘the fall of the leaf’ because the victim has reached the ‘autumn of life’ and drops like a withered leaf.
1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks 37/2: Falling leaf, when an execution is taking place (prison).
1997		Share Slanguage.

leaf of the old author (n.)

see line of the old author under line n.¹