Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a prison; thus, spec. in London, Old Nask, City Bridewell prison; New Nask, Clerkenwell prison; Tuttle Nask, Tothill Fields prison.

1639		J. Taylor Crabtree Lectures 191: Cove. But sto Mort: what if I should bee Cloyed in the milling of Cacklers, Quacklers, or Duds, or nipping a Bung, and so be cloyed, & budged to the Naskin.
1663		Wandring-Whores Complaint 3: I pikt off too nimbly for them, otherwise I would have been in the Naskin.
1674		Head Canting Academy (2nd edn) 53: Quire Birds are such who have sung in the Whit, the Naskin; that is, Newgate, Bridewell, or some Country Goal, who having got loose fall to their old trade of Roguing and Thieving again.
1680		Head Eng. Rogue IV 152: Which Arts are divided into that of High-Padding, Low-Padding, [...] Ken-Milling, Jerk the Naskin.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Nask c. or Naskin, c. A Prison or Bridewell. The old Nask, c. the City Bridewell. The new Nask, c. Clerkenwell Bridewell. Tuttle Nask, c. the Bridewel in Tuttle-Fields. He Napt it at the Nask, c. he was Lasht at Bridewell.
1703		Hell Upon Earth 5: Naskin, a Prison.
1719		A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) II [as cit. c.1698].
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1754		Scoundrel’s Dict. 15: Bridwel – Naskin.
1768		(con. 1710–25) Tyburn Chronicle II in Groom (1999) xxvi: Old Nass London-Bridewell.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Nask or Naskin, a prison or bridewell; the new nask, Clerkenwell bridewell; Tothill-fields nask, the bridewell at Tothill-fields, (cant).
a.1790		H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795).
1809		G. Andrewes Dict. Sl. and Cant.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1827		Commercial Advertiser (N.Y.) 1 Feb. 2/3: The Charlies being called, before [the rowdies] could burn the ken, . . . they were nabbed and carried to the nask, . . . and in the morning brought before the Beak.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum.