tickler n.
1. a sword [it ‘tickles the ribs’].
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Northward Hoe IV i: Shalls to horse, hears a tickler. |
2. a puzzle, something or someone that is hard to deal with or understand [it tickles one’s brain].
| Way to Get Married in Inchbold (1808) XXV 61: By this time he’s safe. I think I’ve given him a tickler. | |
| Jorrocks Jaunts (1874) 11: The fox, who has often had a game at romps with his pursuers, being resolved this time to give them a tickler. | |
| Little Ragamuffin 102: To an unpractised barker strawberries were decidedly a tickler. [Ibid.] 249: If you was to see how they go creepin’ in the shadders and hidin’ [...] you’d know in a minute what a tickler it was. | |
| Sl. Dict. 322: Tickle ‘a reg’lar tickler’ is a poser. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Aus. Sl. Dict. 85: Tickle, to puzzle; ‘a regular tickler,’ a poser. | |
| Bulletin (Sydney) 6 Jan. 32/1: On each side of me a mountain, / Just how high I wasn’t countin’, / But completely perpendic’lar! / ’Twas a tickler / And a treat! |
3. (US) a small measure of spirits (approx. 300ml/½ pint), a hip flask [it tickles the palate].
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Life of General F. Marion (1816) 165: The chat went round very briskly, and dram after dram, the brandy until the tickler was drained to the bottom. | |
 | Southern Sketches 33: Then he took out a tickler of whiskey [F&H]. | |
| ‘Mike Hooter’s Bar Story’ Spirit of the Times 26 Jan. (N.Y.) 581: I told my gal Sal to fill my privit tickler full o’ the old ‘raw.’. | |
| Bill Arp 77: On such occasions they load themselves down with dry goods, and wet goods, [...] and boots and booty, and ticklers, and canteens with contents noticed. | |
| Americanisms 642: Tickler has, in America, two special meanings: it denotes a small flask for holding liquor [...] In the South the phrase, to ‘take a tickler,’ is often used as an invitation to ‘join in a drink.’. | |
| In the Tennessee Mountains 138: There was circulating among Jerry Shaw’s friends a flat bottle, facetiously denominated ‘tickler,’ readily emptied but as readily replenished from a keg. | |
| ‘A Baffled Orator’ Sporting Times 2 June 1/4: And there seemed no ribald spirit there a rude remark to shed, / Save a damsel with a ‘tickler,’ and with cheeks perhaps too red. |
4. (US) a blow; also fig. use.
| [ | | Every Night Book 83: Their [i.e. prize-fighters’] language he would find mighty mysterious [...] To ‘tickle his sneezer,’ is breaking his nose]. |
| John Smith I i: Down went one by a left-handed facer – down went one by a right-handed tickler. | |
| Clockmaker III 155: [I] have half a mind to give you a tickler in the ribs. | |
| Paul Pry 13 Nov. n.p.: We shall drop in next week, and see if there is any alteration: if not, expect a regular tickler. | |
| (con. 1827) Fights for the Championship 105: He [...] was evidently suffering from Crawley’s tickler. | |
| Bell’s Life in Sydney 9 Mar. 3/2: He delivered [...] a tickler on the sneezer which produced a very disagreeable ‘titillation of the olfactory nerves’. | |
| Wild Boys of London I 250/1: Burglary, eh? that’s a tickler for Joseph Lane and his stuck-up wife. | |
| Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 2 Oct. 14/2: ‘Vally’ got a tickler In the ribs recently that made him wish he had worn a catcher’s protector. |
5. an amusing piece of iinformation.
| Satirist (London) 15 May 46/1: Croker promised Hook a tickler on Lord Brougham, for his penny-trumpet Bull Dog. |
6. a knowing individual.
| Soldier’s Bride 170: ‘Egad that’s a keen smart girl!’ said one gentleman. ‘She’s a tickler, I warrant her!’ said a second. ‘She’s a pirate, by thunder!’ roared Captain Halliard. | |
| , | | Life and Adventures. |
7. (US) an unstable individual.
| Flash (NY) 3 Dec. n.p.: ‘Who is that girl, dressed so gay, just going up to the bar?’ [...] ‘That is the “Boston Tickler” and she is crazy’. |
8. (US) a small knife or pistol.
| Martin Chuzzlewit (1995) 519: A sword-stick, which he called his ‘Tickler.’ and a great knife, which (for he was a man of a pleasant turn of humour) he called ‘Ripper.’. | |
| Americanisms 642: In one of the sidestreets of New York the following advertisement used to hang over the door of a large and imposing building: ‘Pocket-pistols charged, and ticklers supplied, on Saturday night up to 12 o’clock, for use next day.’. | |
| Mirror of Life 24 Aug. 2/2: Little more than fifty years ago America was the home of the ‘ripper,’ ‘tickler,’ and ‘persuader,’ and England was renowned as the birthplace of an art which was supposed to be the antidote to that bane. |
9. a police truncheon.
| Bell’s Life in Sydney 16 Mar. 3/3: His baton drew forth that persuasive orator, with which he whispered a word or two of sense into Mick’s unwilling ear. Mick, however, was not convinced [...] but, seizing the tickler, made therewith an eloquent and vigorous appeal to the feelings of his pertinacious foe. |
10. a whip or cane.
| Great Expectations (1992) 7: Tickler was a wax-ended piece of cane, worn smooth by collision with my tickled frame. | |
| In Strange Company 163: I don’t recollect whether Mrs. Joe Gargery’s ‘tickler,’ [...] was nothing more formidable than this article. |
11. a short poker used to preserve the smarter, ‘best’ one.
| Sl. and Its Analogues. |
12. (Aus. und.) a pimp; a prostitute’s kept lover.
| Aus. Sl. Dict. 85: Tickler, the favourite fellow or‘fancy man,’ supported by women of no repute. |
13. the penis.
| (con. 1920–57) Ozark Folksongs and Folklore II 787: Other common names for the male organ are [...] tickler, tilly-whacker, tool, and ying-yang. |
14. the vagina.
| Sl. and Its Analogues. | |
| Memoirs of Madge Buford 130: ‘How’s this for a pretty tickler?’ [and] she stretched one of my legs, showing my fucking facilities. | |
| Man Who Was Not With It (1965) 306: Grab her quick, and if she hollers, tickle her tickler. | |
| Ozark Folksongs and Folklore I 176: The original title was ‘St. Louis Tickler’ – tickler meaning the clitoris, from the German kitzler. |
15. (US) a moustache.
| Little Caesar (1932) 256: Tickler, a moustache. | |
| High Sierra in Four Novels (1984) 434: I knew Healy would [...] tell everybody I was wearing glasses and a moustache. I’d have shaved off the tickler if I’d had time. |
16. (Aus.) an electric battery.
| Cobbers 42: ‘I get in a good pozzy, and if one of the bastards [bullocks] jibs I touch him up with a tickler.’ ‘What’s that?’ ‘Electric battery. Does no harm, but it makes ’em think, quick and and lively.’. |
17. (US) a pianist [abbr. ivory-tickler under ivory n.; ult. tickle the ivories under tickle v.; note Ward, The dancing School (1700): ‘the Ticklers of Cat-Guts’ i.e. violinists].
| Blues for the Prince (1989) 126: ‘All these rhythm ticklers is nuts.’ The piano man prodded the table. | |
| Jazz Rev. July 13: He’s the last of the real old-time ticklers. | |
| Down Beat 16 Aug. 26: The gaiety and sly humor that one looks for in a true ‘tickler.’. | |
| Indep. Rev. 19 Feb. 8: A Hounslow-born drop-out from Twickenham art college and organ-tickler with a brace of blues bands. |
18. a cigarette.
| (con. WW2) Heart of Oak [ebook] Someone offered me a cigarette. ‘Here, a have a tickler’. |
19. see French tickler under French adj.
20. see tickle n. (2)