Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Irish) a reprimand from the Church, spec. from a bishop.

1975		Studies 253-60 191: The ‘belt of the crozier’ was less feared and both Church and Ireland were changing.
1982		J.P. McEvoy Robert Grosseteste 24: He felt bound once or twice on the way through to give the old pagan a belt of the crozier.
1993		T.P. Coogan Dev: Long Fellow, Long Shadow n.p.: The backlash created by this [...] was summed up in another notable ‘belt of the crozier’ directed at the Irish Parliamentary Party by the Bishop of Derry [BS].
2009		T.P. Coogan Ireland in 20th Century 372: This was no mere belt of the crozier. It was an episcopal salvo which would have the ultimate effect of destroying Browne's political career.
2011		A. Emery Death at Christy Burke’s 20: ‘Word went round about the planned speech, and they got a belt of the crozier.’ ‘I take it that means the bishop disapproved,’ Monty interjected. ‘The bishop indeed. The Cardinal Archbishop of Armagh, Primate of All Ireland’.

to be rejected, to be jilted.

1938

J. Curtis They Drive by Night 232: You wasn’t no loss when you got the belt.

(orig. Aus.) to get rid of, to throw out, to dismiss, to reject, to jilt.

1936		J. Curtis Gilt Kid 48: Perhaps his girl had given him the belt.
1958		F. Norman Bang To Rights 117: There were so many geezers getting the belt all the time. [...] There was one geezer who’s old woman gave him the belt so often that he never knew where he was. [Ibid.] 167: I can always give her the Lonsdale after a week or two.
1959		F. Norman Stand on Me 52: She would have to give her job the belt.

underhand, illegal, cheating.

1844		Dublin Monitor 7 Feb. 2/4: Mr Fitzgibbon said this prosecution was unfairly conducted — his phrase was, that it was ‘a blow below the belt’.
1849		Punch 16 95/1: Punch commenced his attack on the Alderman's smeller, on which he planted several scientific hits, but to no purpose [...] The Alderman retorted by a blow aimed below the belt, which, however, did not tell home.
1855		U.S. Review (NY) Aug. 156: If a man is down, [the editor] kicks him. He is never ‘game,’ but always strikes ‘below the belt’.
1859		G. Meredith Ordeal of Richard Feverel 297: In the prize-fight of fife, my dear Austin, our Uncle Hippias has been unfairly hit below the belt.
1861		Household Jrnl (NY) 1 June 136/2: Though wo cannot now avoid the battle [i.e. the US Civil War], we can agree in making it a fair stand-up fight, with no striking below the belt, or hitting a man after he is down.
1866		Dublin Eve. Mail 17 May 2/4: ‘ Liberal Conservative’ strikes below the belt in his strictures upon the ‘the Attorney General and his votes’.
1867		G.W.H. Griffin Hamlet the Dainty Act III: ham.: Another hit, Laertes, in the stomach (Laertes down) laer.: Then it’s below the belt, you great big lummox.
1875		Bath Chron. 12 Aug. 5/2: Mr Cossham complained [...] that the Tory press in their criticisms of him [...] were given to ‘hitting below the belt’.
1880		Hants. Teleg. 15 May 6/3: As a politician he rather glories in hitting below the belt.
1885		Lichfield Mercury 20 Nov. 5/1: The example set by Sir John Swinburne of hitting his rival [...] ‘below the belt’ — in other words of maligning Mr Mosley’s father — has been copied with a vengeance.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues I 175/1: To strike a man below the belt [...] is akin with ‘To stab a man in the back’.
1895		Sheffield Indep. 16 July 4/6: To insinuate that such a man would be swayed in his principles by a few shillings difference [...] is, on the face of it, hitting below the belt.
1896		N.Y. Tribune 20 Dec. 48/1: I felt it would be like hitting him below the belt to ask him to the house.

(orig. RAF) to be quiet; esp. in excl. belt up! shut up!

1958		Chronicle-Telegram (Elyria, OH) 5 Nov. 21/6: ‘Belt up’ has nothing to do with aviation but is a polite and stern admonition to be quiet.
1963		H.E. Bates Oh! To be in England (1985) 426: Keep your big mouth shut [...] Belt up.
1972		P. Fordham Inside the Und. 163: Jacko tells her to belt up.
1982		P. Theroux London Embassy 153: Oh, belt up.
1998		J. Hoskison Inside 146: At my golf club I could tell a friend to belt up if he started to drone on.

(Aus.) to be the outstanding example, the ‘champion’.

1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 31 Oct. 12/4: As a sarcastic cuss, Alderman Bowmer, of West Botony, holds the belt.
1912		Bulletin (Sydney) 17 Oct. 16/3: One Joe Hallam, otherwise unknown to fame, holds the belt as pilot of the biggest load ever stacked on a waggon.

(US gay) to be a promiscuous ‘feminine’ lesbian.

1965

K. Worthy Homosexual Generation Ch. xvi: To Lower Your Belt: A female homosexual who will go with anyone who asks her as opposed to the ones who try to ‘go steady’ even in prison.

(US teen) to be exceptional, to ‘take the biscuit’ .

1884		Argosy 3 326: Uncle Sam has done pretty well with trees, but when it comes to height the British lion takes the belt.
1885		‘High School Sl.’ in N.Y. Dispatch 31 May 7: ‘My, though, don’t he think he’s an awful swell?’ ‘Well, I should smile — he takes the belt.’.
1892		Caldwell Trib. (ID) 10 Dec. 6/3: Take the Belt. Walter Cleavage has his radish on exhibition [...] The radish measures fifteen and one-half inches.
1907		Oasis (Arizola, AZ) 9 Mar. 11/1: Of all the blood suckers that drain the ready money out of a community the mail order houses take the belt.

(US) to hand over money.

1896		H. Blossom Checkers 236: He’s likely to ‘unbelt’ right away.
1899		Ade Fables in Sl. (1902) 114: I will go to my Wife’s Brother and make a Quick Touch. If he refuses to unbelt I will threaten to tell his Wife of the bracelet he bought in Louisville.
1910		Wodehouse Gentleman of Leisure Ch. xxvii: My advice, if asked, would be to unbelt before the shooting begins.
1911		S. Ford Torchy 294: [She] unbelts reckless for the sterling decoration.
1917		Van Loan ‘A Morning Workout’ in Old Man Curry 217: It ain’t like him to unbelt for a chunk.
1923		Wodehouse Inimitable Jeeves 63: I unbelted the fiver.

1. in one’s stomach, swallowed.

1771		Smollett Humphrey Clinker (1925) I 76: He was carried home with six good bottles of claret under his belt.
1842		S. Lover Handy Andy 291: The lord chief justice always goes to bed, they say, with six tumblers o’ potteen under his belt.
1848		Thackeray Vanity Fair I 177: Colonel Heavytop took off three bottles of that you sent me down, under his belt the other day.
1857		T. Hughes Tom Brown’s School-Days (1896) 73: A capital spinner of a yarn when he had broken the neck of his day’s work, and got plenty of ale under his belt.
1878–9		A. Garcia Tough Trip Through Paradise (1977) 20: There is nothing that will warm the cockles of an Indian’s heart [...] like a couple of shots of good old red-eye whiskey under his belt.
1891		W. De Vere ‘Jim Marshall’s New Pianner’ Tramp Poems 9: He landed one beneath his belt.
1896		Ade Artie (1963) 34: Mebbe that’s because he had a few under his belt, but anyway it went with me.
1903		A. Adams Log of a Cowboy 380: Then with a few drinks under my belt and a rim-fire cigar in my mouth.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 366: Tonopah [...] had acquired a fair amount of the demon rum under his belt.
1915		H.L. Wilson Ruggles of Red Gap (1917) 99: Looked like it would help a lot for them to [...] get a few shots of hooch under their belts.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 154: After their feed with a good lot of fat soup under their belts.
1929		T. Wolfe Look Homeward, Angel (1930) 190: He ain’t worth a damn until he’s got a quart of corn liquor under his belt.
1939		H. Miller Tropic of Capricorn (1964) 62: I had to have something under my belt to carry on, and I wanted something nourishing.
1943		G.A. Little Malachi Horan Remembers 118: Every man in form with a drink below his belt to keep out the fog.
1947		B. Schulberg Harder They Fall (1971) 104: It was an effort for him to make polite conversation until he had the first couple under his belt.
1954		Wodehouse Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit 12: With two of Jeeves’ specials under my belt.
1961		(con. 1930s) D. Behan Teems of Times and Happy Returns 172: Not yet, sundown, wait’ll I get somethin’ under me belt before I help yeh.
1961		B. Crump Hang On a Minute, Mate (1963) 45: A man working as hard as they were couldn’t be expected to keep going without a feed under his belt.
1979		F. Norman Too Many Crooks Spoil the Caper 60: I already had threequarters of a bottle under my belt.
2000		Daily Express 20 May 21: He had quite a few beers under his belt.
2007		S. Maloney Sucked In 237: Margot had a glass in her hand and several under her belt.

2. (also under one’s vest) personally achieved or experienced.

1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 251: I may have a few balls under my belt, y’know [...] but I’m allus a gen’leman, see?
1924		D. Hammett ‘The Tenth Clew’ in Continental Op (1975) 14: Brisk and fresh with five hours’ sleep under my belt.
1933		Portsmouth Eve. News 10 Dec. 9/4: Hal O’Neil [...] has some meritorious victories under his belt.
1942		R. Chandler High Window 208: Then Mr Vannier breezed on home, still rather annoyed [...] but with the satisfaction of a good afternoon’s work under his vest.
1951		Green & Laurie Show Biz from Vaude to Video 8: Any American actor with a foreign tour under his belt found his stock boosted at home.
1959		M. Richler Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1964) 221: Three productions under his belt.
1960		Wodehouse Jeeves in the Offing 61: With this under her belt, she’ll be able to forbid the banns in no uncertain manner.
1964		Larner & Tefferteller Addict in the Street (1966) 57: I had six arrests under my belt.
1998		L. Stringer Grand Central Winter (1999) 42: He may have a few million under his belt. But he is no snob.
1999		Guardian Editor 18 June 14: Six Wimbledons, several Davis Cups and a few Olympics under her belt.
2000		Guardian Rev. 21 Apr. 17: With that under his belt he might easily have faded away.
2000		J. Hawes Dead Long Enough 285: With these forty winters under my widening belt.