Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. porridge; also attrib.

1754		E. Burt Letters from Scotland I 209: Your ordinary Fare has been little else beside Brochan, Cale, Stirabout, Sowings, etc.
1766		Newcastle Courant 12 July 1/2: One Pound of Rice, and two Quarts of Milk, boiled thick as Stirabout [...] will make two pounds of good wholesome Food.
1769		Derby Mercury 16 Jan. 1/2: A worthy [...] Gentleman [...] has warmly recommended the Rearing of Calves with Bean-Meal: This made into Stir-about [...] affords the young Animals wholesome and effectual Nourishment.
1785		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘The Lousiad’ Works (1794) I 301: Leek porridge, stirabout, we’ll sooner want.
1832		S. Lover Legends and Stories 158: Oh, by gor, the butther’s comin’ out o’ the stirabout.
1846		London Standard 9 June 3/1: The prisonrs in Limerick county gaol have mutinied about indian meal stirabout.
1850		Hereford Times 26 Jan. 7/5: The insurgents successfully assailed them for some time with the hot ‘stirabout’ with which they had been provided for supper.
1863		‘Rafferty’s Party’ Donnybrook-Fair Comic Songster 51: Stirabout with new milk and whey.
1867		‘Johnny Cross’ ‘The Cat In The Corner’ Orig. Pontoon Songster 65: Och, I weep for the day I was freed from my cot, / My praties and milk, and my stirabout pot.
1879		C.J. Kickham Knocknagow 62: She followed Honor outside the door, with the stirabout stick smoking in her hand.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 14 Feb. 6/4: ‘Now the butter is comin’ out ov the stirabout,’ as they say in the sunny South of France. [Ibid.] 9 May 9/1: We say this diffidently, but we’ve known a course of water-cress and ‘stirabout’ to temper the tendency to undue protuberance and restore the original lines of beauty.
1893		F.P. Dunne in Schaaf Mr Dooley’s Chicago (1977) 190: They had [...] oatmale stirabout.
1903		J. London People of the Abyss 255: At twelve o’clock it gets dinner, composed of a tin of coarse Indian meal stirabout (skilly).
1914		Joyce ‘The Dead’ Dubliners (1956) 178: He’s really an awful bother [...] forcing Eva to eat the stirabout. The poor child!
1921		Eve. Teleg. 5 Dec. 3/4: A man backed out of marriage simply because he disliked the way his ladylove stirred the stirabout.
1940		‘Flann O’Brien’ Third Policeman (1974) 105: ‘I have put the stirabout on the table,’ he said, ‘and the milk is still hot from being inside the cow’s milk-bag.’.
1966		P. Boyle At Night All Cats Are Grey 60: I think another basin of stirabout would be in order.
1970		C. Brown Down All the Days (1990) 73: Ma – the stirabout they give us in the mornings does be freezing cold!
1986		P. O’Farrell Tell me, Sean O’Farrell 90: Eating only a plate of stirabout a day – oh and the odd raw turnip!
1993		(con. 1930s) M. Verdon Shawlies, Echo Boys, the Marsh and the Lanes 88: Some weeks we’d have stirabout for days. That’d be oatmeal. Some of the neighbours wouldn’t touch it, called it famine food.
1999		(con. 1919) R. Doyle A Star Called Henry (2000) 217: Stirabout and slidderjacks and cakes of rough bread.

2. any pudding that requires stirring.

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

3. prison.

1910

‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘A Derby Bet’ Sporting Times 28 May 1/2: I’d no news in the ‘stirabout’ yonder.

a sodomite, a male homosexual.

1890–1904

Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

of a woman, to masturbate.

2002

‘xpi3’ ‘Male & Female Masturbation Terms’ at Spankmag.com 22 Oct. 🌐 Stirring it up.

to get a move on; to dance; to do one’s duty keenly.

1579		S. Gosson School of Abuse (1868) 51: If it be the dutie of euery man in a common wealth, one way or other to bestirre his stumpes, I cannot but blame those lither contemplators very much, which sit concluding of Sillogisumes in a corner.
1590		Cobbler of Canterbury (1976) 23: A Cobbler [...] who was woont [...] on holy daies to bestirre his stumps in the Church-yard so merrily.
1606		Wily Beguiled 72: Come Pegge, bestirre your stumps: make thyself smuggo, wench.
1612		Dekker O per se O L4: It is for seauen causes that they bestirre their stumps.
1622		J. Mabbe (trans.) Life of Guzman Pt II Bk II 107: I was forced to buckle up my selfe, and bestirre my stumps.
1632		R. Brome Covent-Garden Weeded II i: Thou must bestir thy stumps a little further.
1635		H. Glapthorne Lady Mother II i: Come, stir your shanks nimbly.
1654		Webster Appius and Virginia III i: I warrant you I can bestir my stumps as soon as another.
1664		C. Cotton Virgil Travestie (1765) Bk I 28: Haste to Carthage, stir your Stumps.
1705–07		N. Ward Hudibras Redivivus I:2 17: I had not long, on City Stones, / Bestirr’d my Stumps and Marrow-bones.
1734		C. Johnson Hist. of Highwaymen &c. 62: My Arse, answered the Footman; if you don’t stir your Stumps, I’ll rouze you away presently, you canting Son of a Bitch.
1764		K. O’Hara Midas II i: I’ll lead her such a dance Shall make her stir her stumps.
1778		F. Moore Songs and Ballads of the Amer. Revolution (1855) 234: Clinton’s name alarmed his mind, / And made him stir his stumps.
1785		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘The Lousiad’ Works (1794) I 194: The dread of gasping on the fatal fork [...] Was full enough to make him stir his stumps.
1797		Bridges Burlesque Homer (4th edn) II 89: I shall stir my stumps.
1801		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘Epistle to Count Rumford’ Works (1801) V 448: A knife and fork, a dish, spoon, and platter, Should stir their stumps.
1802		Sporting Mag. Sept. XX 316/1: Teddy grew sulky [...] and neither intreaties nor blows could persuade him (to use his rider’s phrase) ‘to stir a peg’.
1815		D. Humphreys Yankey in England 32: Come along: stir your stumps!
1825		C.M. Westmacott Eng. Spy I 382: So stir your stumps, my tight one, or I shall drive over you.
1831		‘Gallery of 140 Comicalities’ Bell’s Life in London 24 June 4/1: The Devil has been stirring his shanks.
1836		‘The Spring Leg’ Comic Songster and Gentleman’s Private Cabinet 35: He could hardly stir a peg.
1838		W.N. Glascock Land Sharks and Sea Gulls II 125: What I wants, I wants now [...] so stir yer stumps.
1840		T. Haliburton Letter-bag of the Great Western (1873) 63: It was ‘cutting his stick’ with a vengeance; it was not marching, but ‘stirring his stumps’.
c.1850		F.M. Whitcher Widow Bedott Papers (1883) 113: Now start yer stumps, and fetch them things quick meeter.
1850		Leeds Mercury 12 Jan. 6/3: Monopoly cannot stir a peg from his degraded position.
1862		letter in Silber & Sievens Yankee Correspondence (1996) 67: If I was out of the army, I wouldn’t stir a peg to enlist.
1864		W.R. Floyd Handy Andy in Darkey Drama 5 61: Stir your stumps! go down into the kitching, and get my toast an’ tea.
1865		Kentish Chron. 19 Aug. 4/4: You’ll be bowled out, my jockey! You’d better stir your stumps.
1873		J. O’Connor Wanderings of a Vagabond 147: Here, Justice, stir your stumps and let the Major and myself have a drink.
1884		Kansas Chief (TX) 20 Mar. 4/1: Thus Brown was fixed, and could not stir his pegs.
1899		Seattle Post-Intelligencer (WA) 24 July 8/4: Who has good legs must stir his pegs.
1908		K. Grahame Wind in the Willows (1995) 258: Stir your stumps, Toad, and look lively!
1922		H.L. Wilson Merton of the Movies 8: Now, for gosh’s sake, stir your stumps!
1932		M. Marshall Travels of Tramp-Royal 153: I saw that if I would sleep under shelter that night I had better stir my pins.
1961		‘Frank Richards’ Billy Bunter at Butlins 174: Next time you feel too lazy to stir a stump, you’ve only got to ask us to chuck you over a deck-chair.
1972		(con. 1916) G. Swarthout Tin Lizzie Troop (1978) 111: It’s not too late to stir my stumps.

(N.Z.) to criticize harshly, to reprimand severely.

1984		Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1157/2: since ca. 1940.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 108/1: stir shit out of to scold comprehensively.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].

(US) of a white man, to have sex with a black woman.

2017

D. Winslow The Force [ebook] Russo and Big Monty, they know you’re stirring tar?

see under porridge n.

see under possum n.

(N.Z.) to deliberately cause trouble.

2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl.
2021		P. Papathanasiou Stoning 284: Ahmed had been stirring the pot, talking to his colleagues, plotting, protesting, rioting.

to masturbate, usu. of a woman.

2002

B. Healey ‘U4ME’ (poem) on Originality 🌐 (Not to be sexist) Stirring the sauce, thickening the gravy / Polishing your fingertips, tickling the baby.

to go out of one’s way to make trouble, esp. by gossiping or telling tales.

1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 190: stir some shit (kwn San Diego, late ’60s) to gossip.
1974		G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 160: Once you broke into that higher strata and began to stir that shit, there was too much and too many involved.
1994		M. Montague Dread Culture 160: Word is somebody high up [...] wants to put it to the new superintendent and stir up some shit while he’s at it.
2004		P. Howard PS, I Scored the Bridesmaids 220: Stop listening to Erika [...] She’s just trying to stir shit.
2004		Simon & Lehane ‘Dead Soldiers’ Wire ser. 3 ep. 3 [TV script] ‘You stirring up some shit?’ [...] ‘For the good of our fair city’.
2007		L. Redhead Cherry Pie [ebook] ‘No. I was lobbying for minimum wages [...] women having control over their own bodies—’ ‘You were stirring up shit’.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 244: Sometimes the shit these guys stir takes time to brew.

to visit without any previous announcement.

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

the Sunday before Advent.

1858		Wilts. Indep. 20 May 4/1: The tinest Collect, say that for Stir-up Sunday, ought to serve him.
1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. (2nd edn) 228: Stir-up Sunday the Sunday next before Advent, the collect for that day commencing with the words, ‘Stir up.’ Schoolboys, growing excited at the prospect of the vacation, irreverently commemorate it by stirring up ? pushing and poking each other. CRIB CRUST MONDAY and TUG BUTTON TUESDAY are distinguished by similar tricks; while on PAY OFF WEDNESDAY they retaliate small grudges in a playful facetious way.
1868		Hants. Advertiser 28 Nov. 7/4: Sunday last, November 22, is familiarly known as Stir up Sunday.
1871		Bell’s Wkly Messenger (London) 2 Dec. 4/5: It would be an anachronism to look glum within a week of ‘Stir-up Sunday’.
1882		Sth London Press 9 Dec. 9/3: The paupers of Lambeth are to have their small beer at Christmas [...] Stir-up Sunday seems to have a wonderful effect upon the Lambeth Board.
1892		W. Sussex Co. Times 10 Dec. 3/4: Stir-up Sunday, apart from its religous significance, is [...] a reminderr to good housewives to begin preparations for [...] mincemeat and plum puddings.
1909		Preston Herald 8 Sept. 4/1: At Giggleswick [school] [...] on Stir-up Sunday [...] the boys begin to give a slant to their hats.
1916		Wigton Advertiser 9 Dec. 3/2: The twenty-fifth Sunday after Trinity was known as — Stir-up Sunday’.
1927		Tatler (London) 30 Nov. 82/2: The twenty-fifth Sunday after Trinity was, as we know, — Stir-up Sunday’.
1938		Littlehampton Gaz. 18 Nov. 6/2: Howq many people know that next Sunday is — ‘stir-up’ Sunday.
1948		Buckingham Advertiser 27 Nov. 4/1: ‘Stir up’ Sunday for the collect for the day begins with the words ‘stir up’ [...] a playful allusion to the preparation of Christmas puddings.
1958		Birmingham Dly Post 24 Dec. 4/3: Christmas really began on ‘Stir-up Sunday’ [...] the day my mother always mixed the mincemeat.
1966		Long Eaton Advertiser 25 Nov. 10/4: Referring to the day’s collect, prefaced with ‘stir up’ [...] he pinted out that it gave the name ‘Stir-up Sunday’.
1971		Ilus. London News 2 Nov. 56/2: Even in my childhood it was still known as Stir-up Sunday [...] Cook made the puddings and each member of the family had to stir the great bowl.
1991		Drogheda Argus Spectrum 1 Nov. 22/3: ‘Stir-up Sunday’ when the Christmas pudding is traditionally made, takes place when?