snitch n.1
1. a blow on the nose.
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Snitch, [...] a Filip on the Nose. | |
| New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698]. | |
| , , , | | Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698]. |
| Life and Character of Moll King 12: I’ll derrick, my Blood, if I tout my Mort, I’ll tip her a Snitch about the Peeps and Nasous. |
2. (UK Und.) the nose.
| Dict. | |
| Canting Academy, or the Pedlar’s-French Dict. 115: Nose Snich. | |
| Discoveries (1774) 42: Snich; Nose. | |
| New Dict. Cant (1795). | |
| Dict. Sl. and Cant. | |
| Flash Dict. | |
| Mysteries of London vol. 2 142: Snitch Nose. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Vocabulum. | |
| Sheffield Gloss. (Supp.) 54: Snitcher, the nose. | |
| Nottingham Eve. Post 21 Dec. 3/3: If you hit him again [...] I shall flatten your ‘snitcher’. | |
| Liza of Lambeth (1966) 6: I’ll swipe yer over the snitch if yer talk ter me. | |
| Hookey 43: Yesterday, I met a country josser, / And I had him for his watch and chain. / On his snitch I gave him such a gosher. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Fact’ry ’Ands 246: Lookin’ et that nose [...] ’Twasn’t in the nature iv things he could go on sustainin’ sich a snich. | |
| Manchester Courier 18 Jan. 6/7: Jimmy skied one from the boundary [...] and on the rebound hit Snocker Green on the snitcher. | |
| Cockney At Home 136: Ole Cockles fetches him one with his gingham right across the snitch. | |
| Aerbut Paerks, of Baernegum 3: ’Ere, yo stop it off or I shall wipe yer one on the snitcher. | |
| Smith’s Wkly (Sydney) 20 Aug. 11/1: Slanguage [...] Parse and analyse the following: [...] ‘Bli’ me,’ sez I ‘a bloke out to cop yer on th’ snitch’. | |
| This Gutter Life 135: When he was gabbling about holidays I could have snatched him on the snitch! | |
| None But the Lonely Heart 79: A lovely big drip at the end of his snitch. | |
| Lore and Lang. of Schoolchildren (1977) 175: ‘Snitch’ [...] and ‘boko’ for nose. | |
| Muvver Tongue 30: Words used for it are ‘conk’, ‘hooter’ and ‘snich’. | |
| Locked Ward (2013) 245: He put the head on Jake and bust his snitch. |
3. an informer [snitch v. (1)].
| Bacchanalian Mag. 43: Bad luck to every snitch, say I, / Afraid for himself to touch the cly. | |
| Vocab. of the Flash Lang. | |
| Real Life in London I 128: He was a b—dy snitch, and that he would sarve him out—that he wished he might meet him out of St. Giles’s, and he would wake him with an Irish howl. | |
| ‘Jerry Abershaw’s Will’ in Fal-Lal Songster in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) III 17: Said Jerry, I’m no snitch — from hypocrisy I’m free. | |
| ‘Epistle from Joe Muggins’s Dog’ in Era (London) 7 Nov. 3/3: Heach suspects the hother as turned ‘snitch’. | |
| Cincinnati Enquirer (OH) 26 Aug. 4/5: ‘You’re a G-d d-d snitch! You’re snitching for Chief Deitsch’. | |
| Hole in the Wall (1947) 145: Proper reg’lars on all that, paid square, ’ud be more’n I could make playin’ the snitch. | |
| Confessions of a Detective 17: These mugs [...] would croak a snitch in a holy second. | |
| Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist (1926) 188: The dirty snitch that got those fellows railroaded here for seven years. | |
| Mirror (Sydney) 31 Aug. 8/2: A reformed thief, no matter how much he has repented the evil of his ways, hates to be a ‘snitch’ . | |
| Gay-cat 193: The idee is fur all the private detective agencies [...] to toin in the names of the snitches they has workin’ amongst us. | |
| (con. 1910s) Young Lonigan in Studs Lonigan (1936) 72: They knew who did it, but they didn’t want to be snitches. | |
| Man with the Golden Arm 176: I ain’t no big snitch. I ain’t puttin’ the finger on guys. | |
| (con. 1937) Cell 2455 93: The slips against the snitches, the rats, the escape-catchers and others of that breed, he left. | |
| On the Yard (2002) 66: Baby had heard indirectly that Conejo [...] had been a narcotics snitch. | |
| (con. 1970s) Donnie Brasco (2006) 326: Find out. Whoever gives us the snitch, we’ll pay. Then we’ll whack out the snitch. | |
| ‘Let Me Ride’ 🎵 Got the hollow points for the snitches. | |
| ‘Legs’ Oz ser. 3 ep. 3 [TV script] That cripple snitch bitch-ass nigger Hill, we got to whack his ass too. | |
| Turning Angel 376: Nowhere in the notebooks could I find a key to the identity of these snitches. | |
| Intractable [ebook] [T]he historical evolution of the snitch and phizzgig to supergrass status. | |
| Running the Books 165: He knew the code: snitches get stitches. | |
| Killing Pool 213: They’ve narrowed down their prime suspects to three potential snitches . | |
| Mother Jones July/Aug. 🌐 9 percent of male inmates report being sexually assaulted behind bars, but given the anti-snitch culture of prison, the real number might be higher. | |
| Old Scores [ebook] ‘He tells you everything, doesn’t he?’ ‘As you know [...] he’s an A-grade snitch’. | |
| Times 25 May 🌐 [He] added that though he had decided to speak out ‘to protect our community’ he was nevertheless worried about being called a ‘snitch’. | |
| ‘Crime 101’ in Broken 77: Lou knows that there are two ways to solve a crime: 1. A snitch. Someone talks. | |
| What They Was 22: If you talk to [the police] you’re a snitch and if you’re a snitch you become a target . |
4. attrib. use of sense 3.
| On the Yard (2002) 203: The folder was heavy with the snitch letters the warden had cited. | |
| Animal Factory 36: Every day the captain gets a dozen snitch letters about those maniacs. | |
| (con. early 1950s) L.A. Confidential 28: Letting stick-up men slide for snitch dope. | |
| Night Dogs 365: ‘And guess who’s got her on his snitch payroll?’. | |
| Plainclothes Naked (2002) 138: It was an old snitch trick—get them to think you’re humiliated, that you need them. | |
| Snitch Jacket 185: Let’s say you did this for the snitch money. | |
 | ‘Spelled with a K’ in ThugLit Oct. [ebook] I've even acquired a group of snitch informers. |
5. a contemptible person.
| Barber Co. Index (Medicine Lodge, KS) 9 Mar. 1/5: A ‘snitch’ lawyer [...] hunts for a chance tobring damage suits [...] It doesn’t matter to the snitch how blameable the injured party is. | |
| ‘Terms Of Disparagement’ in DN IV:iii 201: snitch, one who is petty, mean. |
6. (US prison) a prisoner who curries favour.
| Thirteen Years in Oregon Penitentiary 35: The ‘head snitch’ (convict flunky) said the bot would not work. |
7. (US black) a piece of information; a newspaper story.
| N.Y. Amsterdam Star-News 17 May 11: This heavy snitch on what the chippies, the chicks , the hens and the harpies did [...] in the House Without Chairs Where the Lights Are Blue. |
In compounds
(US black) untrustworthy, tale-telling.
| Sioux City Jrnl (IA) 23 Feb. 24/2: King scratched his prison name [...] on the door of his jail cell [...] and also inscribed ‘Shawn Berry is a snitch-ass traitor’. | |
| Tuff 118: The only people who want to become politicians are the third-grade snitch-ass hall-monitor types. | |
| (con. 1998–2000) You Got Nothing Coming 154: What are you? [...] Some little punk-ass bitch? A snitch-ass punk whining and puling on his mommy’s titty! | |
| Chicago trib. 28 May 10/1: Katz [...] called him a ‘snitch-ass bitch’. |
(US prison) any game played by those inmates, among them informers, who live in protective segregation.
| Prison Sl. 12: When inmates in the protective segregation unit of a prison are seen playing basketball or some sport, it is jokingly said they are playing snitchball. |
(US black) a newspaper.
| N.Y. Amsterdam News 8 Feb. 20: I latched onto that fine ink in the snitchbook the other bright. |
(US prison) a box used both for institutional correspondence and for passing on messages that accuse fellow inmates of illegal activity.
| Prison Sl. 57: Snitch Box also Kite Box A box in which inmates put institutional correspondence. Often inmates use these boxes to deliver messages about illegal activities of other convicts. |
(US prison) obtaining information from inmates by threatening to falsely expose them as informers.
| St Louis Post-Dispatch (MO) 25 Sept. 11/2: The ‘snitch game’ of coercing informants was begun at the prison about the time of an inmate work strike in June 1976. | |
| Homeboy 226: Snitch game. It’s just as simple as it’s deadly. They coerce information from convicts by threatening to falsely expose them as informers. |
see under jacket n.
(US prison) a note passed by a prisoner, giving information to the authorities.
| Battle Creek Enquirer (MI) 3 Nov. 9/2: ‘Kites’ are notes to prison officials [...] commonly referred to as ‘snitch kites’ — notes that inform on other inmates. | |
| Criminology and Penology 501: A threat from the inmates to send a ‘snitch-kite’—an anonymous note—to the guard’s superior officers explaining his past derelictions in detail. | |
| Riot 86: ‘You’ve never written a snitch-kite, have you?’ [...] ‘Snitch-kite? Certainly not!’. | |
| Would You Convict? 106: He could not protect himself from the latest threat because the mechanism for this, a ‘snitch-kite,’ would take several days to reach authorities. |
(US und.) a payment made to an informer.
| Night Dogs 379: ‘When we were out of the room to sign for that snitch money’. |
1. a notebook.
| Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 76: Notebook—Snitchpad. |
2. a newspaper.
| Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 38: Dig the heavy spiel the snitchpads are spreading, if you wanna play the game the way I do. |
a handkerchief.
| Babes in Darkling Wood 25: Can I borrow your snitch-rag, Gemini? [OED]. |
(US black) a newspaper.
| ‘Jiver’s Bible’ in Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive. | |
| et al. DAUL 201/1: Snitch-sheet. Any newspaper, especially one which makes a practice of sensationalizing criminal cases. |
(US und.) an identification as an informer.
| The Force [ebook] ‘I’ll hang a snitch tag on you at Central Booking. You won’t make it out of Rikers’. |
In phrases
see separate entry.
to become an informer.
| ‘The Dog and Duck Rig’ in I (1975) 80: She will surely turn snitch for the forty. | |
| ‘Cant Lang. of Thieves’ Monthly Mag. 7 Jan. n.p.: He has Split or turned Snitch against his Palls, He has turned evidence against all his Companions. | |
| Morn. Post (London) 29 Aug. 3/2: Some of his former accomplices having, to use the Old Bailey phrase, resolved to turn snitch and blow the gaff. | |
| Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 266: snitch to impeach, or betray your accomplices, is termed snitching upon them. A person who becomes king’s evidence on such an occasion, is said to have turned snitch. | |
| (ref. to late 18C) note to Don Juan Canto XI 149: The following is a stanza of a song which was very popular, at least in my early days [...] ‘She’ll surely turn snitch for the forty – / That her Jack may be regular weight’. | |
| Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: To turn snitch, or snitcher; to turn informer. | |
| ‘Lag’s Lament’ (trans. of an untitled cant poem) in (1829) IV 266: I adwise you to nose on your pals, and turn the / Snitch on the gang. | |
| Land Sharks and Sea Gulls II 112: I’m scragged if I doesn’t have my natural rights. Besides, didn’t Bill threaten to turn snitch? | |
| Swell’s Night Guide 68: Thunder me stupud! if she didn’t turn snitch on him. | |
| Western Times (Devon) 21 Aug. 6/3: The man with the ‘white hat and four wheeler’ [...] may perhaps turn snitch and reveal his employers. | |
| Illus. Police Budget 25 Feb. 7/2: Jim, act square by me [...] but by al the fiends in hell if you turn snitch you’ll find yourself [...] with your throat cut. | |
| Morn. Post 9 Apr. 4/5: He [...] was captured as an accomplice of theives [...] and then turned snitch, squeaked, or blew the gaff. | |
| Times (Montgomery, AL) 24 Sept. 4/1: In the alleged affair [...] Ormiston will be contemptible enough to turn ‘snitch’. | |
| Tampa Trib. (FL) 7 Feb. 9/2: People will not cooperate in enforcement simply because they refuse to turn snitch on their neighbors. | |
| L.A. Times 4 Oct. 51/2: Like most informants, Ralph was eager to ‘turn snitch’ for the police rather than be sent back to prison. | |
| Clandestine (1999) 165: Look, I could turn snitch for you [...] I know lots of people I could turn over. Dope addicts, pushers. | |
| Detroit Free Press (MI) 14 Oct. 11/6: [headline] Drug suspect slain. Some feared ‘Pope’ would turn snitch. | |
| Ricochet 420: He was scared because he knew of others who had tried to turn snitch and died for it. | |
| Atlanta Constitution (GA) 27 Aug. B3/1: They don’t want defendants who turn snitch worrying that their deals might fall about. |