Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a sodomite, a male homosexual.

1810		W. Beckford letter 11 July in Norton Mother Clap’ Molly House (2006) 340: Poor sods – what a fine ordeal, what a procession [i.e. of imprisoned homosexuals], what a pilgrimage, what a song and dance.
1837		House of Commons Parliamentary Papers XIX.45 729: Chairman. Amongst the convict population, would the suspicion of a person having been guilty of unnatural crime excite abhorrence and detestation? No [...] I have heard them jeer at one another, such as calling one another ‘sods.’ Mr Leonard. Is that a term of reproof? Yes, one convict will call another one so.
1855		Yokel’s Preceptor 6: In the neighbourhood of Charing Cross, they posted bills in the windows of several respected public houses, cautioning the public to ‘Beware of Sods!’.
1863		Criminal Life (NY) 19 Dec. n.p.: unnatural monsters Men of all ages, some are mere boys [...] In short they are known as **** [i.e. sods].
1888–94		‘Walter’ My Secret Life (1966) VI 1178: What strange fancies come into my head now! They never used to run so much on the male, but they seem to do so more, since Betsy Johnson got me the sod.
1910		I.L. Pavia Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen No. 11 40: Mary-Ann = Schimpfname fur homosexuelle Manner, ahnlich wie Sod, bugger, twister, (letzteres meistens von Soldaten gebraucht) usw [GS].
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 260: Sods, Fairies, Sads, Masocks—degenerates or sexual perverts according to the type.
1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 176: Sod [...] in England, used to designate a man with unnatural sex habits.
1941		in G. Legman Limerick (1953) 116: A mediaeval recluse named Sissions / Was alarmed by his nightly emissions. / His cell-mate, a sod, / Said, ‘Leave it to God.’ / And taught him some nifty positions.
1946		J. Maclaren-Ross ‘Bitten by the Tarantula’ in Bitten by the Tarantula (2005) 44: You filthy little sod, I wouldn’t wipe myself on your bloody dough!
1956		A. Burgess Time for a Tiger 72: The opium-eating sod sidled off, gurgling.
1979		Maledicta III:2 218: We say sod. We blame the Bulgars for buggery.
1988		J. McDonald Dict. of Obscenity etc.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 114: The gay culture, long a clandestine network, by necessity developed a sophisticated little lingo for communication. This includes [...] such words as sod, an abbreviation of sodomite.

2. an unpleasant person.

1835		‘Rampant Moll Was A Rum Old Mot’ in Secret Songster 5: She stamp’d and tore, she squall’d and swore, / And call’d the svell a sod.
1885		B. Patterson Life in the Ranks 38: Well, I’ll be shot! [...] to think I’ve come all these thousands of miles to be called a ‘slim sod’ by a pack of undersized imps of darkness.
1897		Worker (Brisbane) 4 Sept. 8/4: A decent cook he calls his ‘doc,’ and makes of him a god, / A bad one is a ‘poisoner,’ a ‘slushie’ and a ‘sod.’.
1909		G.R. Bacchus Pleasure Bound ‘Ashore’ 10: ‘His name was John Tucker, / The bugger, the fucker, / The bleeder, the blighter, the sod’.
1912		D.H. Lawrence letter 3 July in Coll. Letters (1962) I 134: Curse the blasted, jelly-boned swines [...] the miserable sodding rotters, the flaming sods [...] that make up England today.
1927		(con. WW1) P. MacDonald Patrol 232: ‘Come on, you sods!’.
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 173: Charlie went on like a mad man, tried to get at the judge to kill him, and called him a sod.
1930		J. Hanley German Prisoner 8: He had been known as [...] a pimp — a shit-house — a toad — a sucker — a blasted sod.
1936		D. Stivens Tramp and Other Stories 11: I was taken in, sports. The lyin’ sod!
1946		K. Amis letter 6 Dec. in Leader (2000) 104: that sod caton occupied most of the time asking me to take his miserable books round Oxford for nothing.
1958		A. Sillitoe Sat. Night and Sun. Morning 51: Just look at what the sods do to me.
1966		P. Willmott Adolescent Boys of East London (1969) 98: There was a real sod at school but the teachers made him a pet.
1976		C. Dexter Last Seen Wearing in Second Morse Omnibus (1994) 406: Look, you miserable sod. You want a fight?
1986		F. Taylor Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 186: Slimy old sod.
1996		A. Close Official and Doubtful 217: Never even spent a tenner on a trick, stingy old sod.
2005		H. Mantel Beyond Black 37: Tell the old sod to bugger off.

3. an act of sodomy.

1870

Cythera’s Hymnal 17: There’s a thing that men with mankind can enjoy / [...] / Arseholes can receive it — what they call a Sod.

4. a person, either neutral or affectionate, often as old sod.

1911		J. Masefield Everlasting Mercy 70: They went, and some cried, ‘Good old sod. / She put it to him straight, by God’.
1923		‘Gila Monster Route’ in N. Anderson Hobo 195: The brakeman hollered, ‘Hit the sod’.
1929–31		Auden ‘Shorts’ in Coll. Poems 51: I’m afraid there’s many a spectacled sod / Prefers the British Museum to God.
1946		D. Hill ‘Chalky’ in Lehmann Penguin New Writing No. 28 184: Blast this sod.
1955		D. Niland Shiralee 121: The black velvet for Macauley; he can’t get the white satin, poor sod.
1966		(con. 1948–52) L. Thomas Virgin Soldiers 16: The poor sod is incapable of getting the next order out.
1972		P. Fordham Inside the Und. 38: She got the poor sod to agree.
1978		(con. 1940s) J.G. Farrell Singapore Grip 158: There was no getting away from the ‘dreary sods’.
1980		A. Burgess Earthly Powers 9: Poor old bugger [...] poor senile decrepit lonely old impotent sod.
1985		J. Morrison Share House Blues 113: ‘And I’m sorry for the poor sod’.
1989		T. Blacker Fixx 208: I love him dearly, but Collin’s a slippery sod.
1999		N. Cohn Yes We have No 203: Do you, Leigh, take this drunk sod to be your righteous old man?
2001		K. Waterhouse Soho 85: Brendan addressed a few words to them in what was presumably Japanese, clever sod that he was.
2010		K. Richards Life 207: I liked john [Lennon] a lot. He was a silly sod in many ways.
2023		R. Milward Man-Eating Typewriter 521: [C]onvincing the poor sods they would be blasted into space.

5. an animal, an object.

1949		R. Park Poor Man’s Orange 83: The puddin’ was the biggest sod God ever allowed to come out of a cloth.
1964		P. Terson Night to Make the Angels Weep (1967) I x: Put the sod in a shed or in a sink or somewheres.
1976		(ref. to 1940s) R. Barnes Coronation Cups and Jam Jars 153: It [a conker] was an ’ard sod, yours, Ron.
1982		P. Bailey An Eng. Madam 31: Sniff, sniff; yap, yap – I was scared the little sod was going to give me away.
2003		(con. 1932) W. Woodruff Beyond Nab End 55: Some ‘sods’ had too many blowholes, cracks, lumps and swells.

6. anything categorized as difficult or annoying to perform.

1936		‘George Orwell’ Keep The Aspidistra Flying (1962) 10: ‘Bare’ is a sod to rhyme; however, there’s always ‘air’.
1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 93: If you come in here of a wet night, it’s a proper sod, I can tell you.
1975		D. Nobbs Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976) 176: It’s a sod.

7. a general term of address, not necessarily pej.

1953		K. Amis letter 6 Nov. in Leader (2000) 340: My poems: hope you’ve subscribed, you sod.
1958		(con. 1940s) B. Behan Borstal Boy 161: Get up, you silly old sod.
1960		B. Kops Dream of Peter Mann Act I: Come on, step right up you silly sods.