Spanish, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

Spanish n.

1. sack, a type of white wine produced in Spain and the Canary Islands.

1618

J. Taylor ‘Taylors Penniless Pilgrimage’ in Works (1869) I 129: The Gentleman [...] caused my horse to bee put into his own stable, whilst we discoursing ouer a pinte of Spanish.

2. (also Spanish money) constr. with the, cash, ready money [? the association of Spain with bullion fleets].

1743		H. Fielding Jonathan Wild I 39: Upon which Wild stepping up, and telling her: ‘[that] she would receive from him twenty Shillings and Nine-pence in ready Money, (for she had only laid out Three-pence in plain Spanish).
c.1786		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions n.p.: Spanish. The Spanish. Ready Money.
1797		Sporting Mag. June X 164/2: Where students come from every part, / Italian, Irish, Danish, / And learn that very useful art, / To live without – the Spanish.
1811		Sporting Mag. XXXVII 303: After extracting the Spanish from all his sporting acquaintance.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1840		R. Barham ‘Lay of the Old Woman Clothed in Grey’ in Ingoldsby Legends (1842) 260: Its synonyms ‘Spanish,’ ‘Blunt,’ ‘Stumpy,’ and ’Rhino’.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 83: spanish Silver coin.
1873		Sl. Dict. 302: Spanish money money. Probably a relic of buccaneering days.

3. a Spanish onion.

1889–90		Barrère & Leland Dict. of Sl., Jargon and Cant.
1894		Chevalier & Ingle [perf. Albert Chevalier] ‘Blue Ribbon Jane’ 🎵 She’d a strip of Spanish and a kidney pie.

4. (US campus) nonsense [negative stereotyping, the language being supposedly incomprehensible].

1901

Monroe & Northup ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:iii 148: Spanish, n. guff; cf. spinach.

5. (US) intercourse whereby the man reaches orgasm by rubbing his penis between a woman’s breasts.

1981

A.K. Shulman On the Stroll 133: Save your body; stick to Swedish massages (by hand), or French (by mouth), and only go Spanish (between the breasts), Russian (between the thighs), American (a body roll), or Danish (inside) if it’s worth the money.

6. (US) in sadomasochism, the use of intense verbal abuse.

1987

personal ad, adult bookstore Murray & Murrell Lang. Sadomasochism (1989) 126: I’m really into Spanish, so lash out at me with your velvet tongue.

In phrases

speak Spanish (v.) [the Spanish dollar, the basic currency of the early years of the Australian colony, worth five shillings (25p); other contemporary coins were the colonial dollar, worth 75% of the Spanish one, and the dump, worth 25%]

(Aus.) to have money.

1827		Monitor (Sydney) 26 July 539/2: Lupus Long-pocket, the sub-Clerk, to whom is entrusted the care of forwarding the applications, has signified as the cause of their detention, the applicant’s ignorance of the ‘Spanish Language’. ‘He must speak Spanish first’; are the words of Lupus [AND].
1832		Hill’s Life N.S.W. (Sydney) 3 Aug. 2: Not being able to speak Spanish, the Bench, of course, sent him to the stocks [AND].
1833		Currency Lad (Sydney) 27 Apr. 2: We shall do it as cheap as any of them. This is what is vulgarly called ‘speaking Spanish’, but it is the best way to be understood [AND].