Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) aware, knowledgeable.

1908		K. McGaffey Sorrows of a Show Girl Ch. xviii: I was a young and trusting thing then [...] so I was not ‘wised’ up to the proper point to believe no man until he makes good.
1913		L. Light Modern Hobo 76: You fellows will learn later on and get ‘wised’ up.
1927		H. Yenne ‘Prison Lingo’ in AS II:6 282: Wised up — To learn the truth of a case; to tell another in order that he may have the details.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 56: Tommy had been wised up to the ways of waterfront etiquette since his few days on his father’s trucks. [Ibid.] 67: Tommy, wised through the underworld grapevine which trickled into the flap ears of Cyclone Tim, waited for the trouble to start.
1934		R. Chandler ‘Finger Man’ in Pearls Are a Nuisance (1964) 73: I’m not wised up on roulette.
1936		K. Mackenzie Living Rough 254: When a guy goes on the bum a while he soon gets wised up.
1947		B. Stiles Serenade to the Big Bird 138: He knows what will make him a strong citizen, and a wised-up member of the world community.
1970		L. Bangs in Psychotic Reactions (1988) 37: Temperamentally incapable [...] of dealing with their constituency of wised-up marks on a one-to-one basis.
1977		(con. 1969) M. Herr Dispatches 65: Some people took a few steps along it and turned back, wised up, with and without regrets.
1985		T. Wolff ‘The Rich Brother’ in Back in the World 218: [H]e was too wised up to listen to anybody’s pitch anymore.
1991		J. Osborne Déjàvu Act I: She was [...] too wiley and wised-up to press any red buttons.
2004		T. Winton ‘Family’ in Turning (2005) 178: He didn’t feel better or stronger for having been wised-up.
2010		K. Richards Life 83: They just wanted to be part of this wised-up enclave.