Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. the nose; thus conk, conk(e)y,a nickname for one who has a large nose; thus conked adj., having a type of nose as specified.

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1823		Sussex Advertiser 11 Aug. 3/4: The sheeny hadone of his ogles closed and his conque damaged.
1824		Pierce Egan’s Life in London 26 Sept. 5/3: [T]he Glazier, in groping for the konk of Bill (a member in which nature to each has been most bountiful), unluckily slipped one of his mauleys between his adversary’s grinders.
1826		J. Bruton ‘My Mugging Maid’ in Farmer Musa Pedestris (1896) 99: The flask that in her fam appeared / The snore that her conk betrayed, / Told me that Hodge’s max had queered / My mugging maid.
1830		Bell’s Life in London 21 Feb. 3/2: With finger on his conck and knowing jen, / And spoke, ‘Enough" — you’re a tight hand, my blade’.
1833		Sydney Herald 24 Feb. 1s/4: Look at that ’ere little ‘konk‘,— there an’t much of the Jew there? that nose ain’t my nose.
1834		‘The Costermonger & His Voman’ in Black Joke 39: His conk vos long and red and pimpled.
1834		Ely’s Hawk & Buzzard (NY) Sept. 6 n.p.: Gaynor made his one-two on Sam’s conck.
1836		‘Jack of Horslydown’ Flash Casket 58: Now let this dishclout grief be done, / That konk a fogle vants.
1838		Dickens Oliver Twist 192: Conkey means Nosey, ma’am.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 8 Jan. n.p.: [H]e met with a stopper on his konk.
1840		H. Cockton Valentine Vox 214: He fancied it proper to put on his nose before he alighted from the cab. ‘Oh! oh! there’s a conk! there’s a smeller! Oh! oh!’ exclaimed about fifty voices in chorus.
1842		Bell’s Penny Dispatch 8 May 2/4: A little blood was visible upon the konk of the Brum.
1845		Bell’s Life in Sydney 13 Dec. 2/2: Hough soon let fly with his left, and delivered broad upon the conk.
1853		N.Y. Clipper 4 June 3/1: Jack sent in his one on English’s conk.
1857		Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne) 17 Oct. 4/1: [G]etting home lightly on Johnny’s conk.
1857		Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne) 18 Apr. 3/5: Kitchen went to work [...] with one-two on his opponent’s left peeper and conch.
1860		Sporting Life (London) 17 Oct. 3/4: Tyler dashed out his left at Gilliam’s conk [...] Bill returned on Tom’s left listener.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 91/1: Why thou bee’st the broken ‘conked’ b—s that i youist to gie my ‘skilly’ tu i’ Wakefield stur.
1870		in G.D. Atkin House Scraps (1887) 54: His ‘dexter ogle’ has a ‘mouse’; His conk’s devoid of bark.
1874		‘Old Calabar’ Won in a Canter I 213: Conky Jim has advertised for to-night. In course he is fly.
1884		Sporting Times 8 Nov. 2/3: Shifter’s nasal organ [...] has gained for him admiration [...] he has risen to conker.
1889		Times-Democrat (New Orleans, LA) 9 July 3/6: Prize Ring Slang [...] ‘claret jug,’ ‘conk,’ ‘nozzle,’ ‘snorer,’ ‘proboscis,’ the nose.
1895		J. Greenwood Behind A Bus 95: It was the sort of nose to get in the way of a scratch [...] Bow-bridged or ‘conkey,’ as it is vulgarly termed.
1895		in Sydney Worker Feb. n.p.: Painted by him I am a narrow, bigoted, snuffle-busting son of a gun whose grog blossomed ‘conk’ gives the lie to his watery protestations.
1900		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 20 Oct. 11/4: Would I stand to be nailed on the conk with a bottle? Echo answers, ‘Nay, Nay!’.
1904		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 13 Jan. 6/4: The razorback conk that the Senor wears on the front of his counting-house.
1905		Marvel III:53 2: Yer orter pay double fer that ’ere conk!
1912		Ade Knocking the Neighbors 88: She would fiddle around for an Opening and then Zowie!—right on the Conk.
1914		E. Pugh Cockney At Home 128: Talking about noses [...] a man came in here the other Sunday with about the handsomest things in conks I’ve ever handled.
1922		Truth (Brisbane) 17 Sept. 9/5: Felt it was robbing the bookie. Looked at his cockatoo conk and it salved my conscience.
1926		N. Fleischer in Ring Nov. 10: conk, smeller, nozzle – The nose.
1930		S.J. Perelman Letter 9 Oct. in Crowther Don’t Tread on Me (1987) 5: One gent more bored than the rest lifts his conk from a glass of mixed schmaltz and pernod and says; ‘I’ll tell you, fella...’.
1938		Observer 28 Aug. 8/5: Conk: nose.
1939		(con. 1880–90s) S. O’Casey I Knock at the Door 226: Don’t be shovin’ your conk in where it isn’t needed or wanted or valued.
1941		V. Davis Phenomena in Crime 34: His huge and bulbous pock-marked nose, ungenerously termed [...] a conk.
1958		E. Newby Short Walk in Hindu Kush (1981) 198: What a great conk he’s got!
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 70: I once shoved that stuff [i.e. snuff] up me conk and me hankie turned brown.
1975		D. Nobbs Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976) 63: Who’s the geyser with the boozer’s conk?
1979		J. Morrow Confessions of Proinsias O’Toole 95: The hooky, droopy obstruction of his conk.
1984		Benjamin & Pearl Limericks Down Under 99: At all the wine shows / He would savour the nose - / And with only the tip of his konk up.
1988		T. Jones Curse of the Vampire Socks 83: A conk like that is just / A drag.
1999		Indep. on Sun. Travel 19 Dec. 6: I had met [...] Nicolo who had an enormous conk of a nose.
2006		D. Mitchell Black Swan Green 157: Mr Dunwoody’s face is fitted around his ginormous conk.

2. (UK Und., also conque) an informer, a thief who betrays his accomplices [‘sniff things out’].

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1819		P. Egan Key to the Picture of the Fancy going to a Fight 14: [A] part of the Gang are serving out a Dandy, whom they take for a conque.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

3. a policeman [‘sniff things out’].

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 249/1: ca.1820–1910.

4. the head; thus -conked, -headed; off one’s conk, crazy, eccentric.

1831		‘Gallery of 140 Comicalities’ Bell’s Life in London 24 June 1/2: For a farden I’d break your precious conk!
1834		York Herald 3 May 4/3: I’m blow’d if I don’t sarve you out on your b—y konk.
1845		Era (London) 26 Jan. 10/3: Weston commenced business with the left, which he [...] planted on his adversary’s conk.
1854		Bell’s Life in Sydney 29 July 2/7: Morgan told a most piteous tale of the hard usage of the prisoner, or more strictly, of his stick, which was smashed into smithereens on his konk.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 15/2: At the next moment he let me have it over the ‘conk’ which sent me staggering.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 101: She’d yell murder when she’d jolt her conk. Eh? Don’t you cop dat: ‘jolt her conk?’ Why, dat’s bump her head.
1902		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden and Mr Paul 23: He skated in on clog shoes, bumps his conk on de carpet enough to give him a headache.
1908		N.Y. Tribune 6 Dec. 10/3: The superintendant preceeded me, a hard conked Scotchman.
1910		Sporting Times 27 Aug. 1/2: That sort o’ bluff may go with some o’ the pin-head conks, but we know better.
1916		O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 2 Aug. [synd. col.] And just then Dudley nailed him on the konk with a bottle of ink.
1919		New Scimitar (Memphis, TN) 31 July 10/2: Golfing [...] Those who followed it for a pastime were comical in the conc — which is English for loose in the attic.
1920		O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 16 Sept. [synd. col.] I’m off to stop this buzzin’ in my conk.
1925		S. Lewis Arrowsmith 228: There’s a lot of [...] foreign slobs that need to be jollied into using their konks about these health biznai.
1927		(con. 1914–18) L. Nason Three Lights from a Match 156: The truck driver was off his conk.
1933		B. Ross Tragedy of Z 103: So much rotgut went to my conk.
1936		R.F. Adams Cowboy Lingo 35: Other slang names used [...] were ‘hair-case,’ ‘conk-cover,’ ‘lid’.
1945		R.L. Bellem ‘Coffin for a Coward’ in Hollywood Detective Dec. 🌐 She [...] started to bonk Bonham over the conk.
1958		M. Allingham Hide My Eyes (1960) 154: There is something experimental down here or I should have my conk seen to.
1963		H.E. Bates Oh! To be in England (1985) 382: What with one thing and another [...] and now the blow on the conk, he felt he couldn’t carry on.
1981		(con. 1920s) P. Crosbie Your Dinner’s Poured Out! 160: They gave me a bang on the top of the conk, / That nearly made me cry.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 120: [A] gangly yearling with an oversize konk atop a broomstick neck .

5. a punch, usu. on the nose.

1978

F. Norman Dead Butler Caper 62: A conk or two on the noggin is likely to knock more sense in than out.

6. intelligence; thinking.

1944

‘Jiver’s Bible’ in D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive.