blinker n.
1. (UK Und.) a wink.
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | ‘De Kilmainham Minit’ in Luke Caffrey’s Gost 7: Wid a Tip of de Slang we replied, / And a Blinker dat Nobody noted. |
2. a one-eyed individual; also used of fighting cocks, horses (see cites 1829, 1889 and 1827, 1835, 1890).
 | Trifles in Rhyme 101: Though worn by my grief nearly thin as a ghost, / I courted three sisters for three months almost; / One was lame as a dog, one was deaf as a post, And— the third had one eye-and a blinker. | |
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Morn. Chron. (London) 16 Aug. 3/5: Johnson was now reduced to a ‘blinker’ with one eye. | |
| Morn. Chron. (London) 21 Aug. 3/4: Cabbage, although a ‘blinker’, with one eye quite floored, is a heavy hitter. | |
| ‘The Mill’ British Minstrelsy 109: There go the four-in-hand swells, there’s a consarn – blow my smock front, if ever I seed such a set-out – twig the crawlers, two tumblers, a puffer, and a blinker. | |
| (ref. to 1725) General Hist. Norfolk III 1293: The following are specimens of the advertisements alluded to ‘Whereas, upon Saturday, 5th June, 1725, there was stolen from William Mecks, of Alethorp, one blue dunn cock, a blinker, two years old, his spurs cut and trimmed’. | |
| Modern Flash Dict. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 5 Nov. n.p.: the whip wants to knowWhether Cad Oakley, the blinker, had the full permission of her mistress . | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Bell’s Life in Sydney 10 Feb. 2/5: Faith I tucked up me sleeves, put me hair back, tuck me cap off, and sed to her only wait a bit; an I’ll see whedder you can prove me a blinker or not. | |
| Florida: a Guide 456: A ' blinker ' is a bird blinded in one eye and is usually given a four-ounce handicap. | |
| Vocab. and Gloss. in True Hist. of Tom and Jerry 159: Blinker. A one-eyed horse. |
3. a hard blow in the eye.
| Pierce Egan’s Life in London 29 May 141/2: Crockey knapped a blinker [and] slipped down on the retreat. | |
| Sl. Dict. |
4. an eye.
| New Elegant Extracts 170: He cocks up his glim at me, — such a blinker ! — I shook like a leaf in a March wind. | |
| Flash Mirror 24: [She] shied it smack at my nob, but it missed me and vent plump in my old ’ooman’s blinker. | |
| Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 25 Dec. n.p.: Wap! he received a flush left-hander over the blinker. | |
| Bell’s Life in Sydney 2 Jan. 2/3: Davis’s left again at work on Jack’s left blinker. | |
| Kendal Mercury 3 Apr. 6/2: Vy, blow me, if he dident turn up his blinkers (eyes) like a croaking quacker (dying duck), and said, ‘if you doesn’t give hover, I’ll get my mother to mill your napper (punch your head). | |
| N.Y. Amsterdam News 5 Jan. 21: The former prizefight manager whose good right hand put the mouse on her blinker. |
5. (orig. US) a black eye.
| Glance at N.Y. II i: That’s a blinker – you wasn’t quick enough. | |
| Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. (2nd edn). | |
| Sl. Dict. | |
| Sl. Dict. | |
| Times-Democrat (New Orleans, LA) 9 July 3/6: Prize Ring Slang [...] ‘Blinker,’ a blackened eye. | |
| Minneapolis Jrnl (MN) 29 Mar. 11/3: She clips him across the map with one of the dog whips. He got sorer than a mink and [...] swore he’d put the blinkers on her. | |
| Dict. of Aus. Words And Terms 🌐 BLINKER–A black eye. | |
| Put on the Spot 96: Would it be too personal, Chief, to inquire how you got that blinker? | |
| Amer. Thes. of Sl. 121: Blackened Eye. Blinker, [...] painted peeper, shanty, shiner, smoked lamp. | |
| Shiralee 220: He had a blinker on the right eye now. |
6. a man, a fellow.
| Our Southern Highlanders (1922) 146: Thae curst horse-leeches o’ the Excise / What mak the whisky stills their prize! [...] Seize the blinkers! (wretches) / And bake them up in brunstane [sic] pies. | |
| DSUE (8th edn) 95/1: late C.19–20. |
7. (US Und.) a police surveillance helicopter.
| Runnin’ Down Some Lines 66: The vehicles and flashing lights that identify their continuous presence in the lives of blacks ([...] blinker for helicopter). |
8. (US) a quadriplegic.
| Nam (1982) 226: There’s a guy who’s a blinker – the quadriplegic – and he got worse than you. |
9. (US) an eyelid.
| Didn’t Nobody Give a Shit 17: She [...] smudged her blinker with the one chalky finger she still had. |
10. see blinkers n. (1)