text:
# THE
COCKNEY
RHYMING
SLANG
DICTIONARY

#### GEOFF
TIBBALLS

## Contents

  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. About the Author
  4. Dedication
  5. Introduction
  6. Cockney to English
  7. English to Cockney
  8. Copyright

  1. Cover
  2. Frontmatter
  3. Table of Contents
  4. Begin Reading

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## About the Author

Geoff Tibballs has written over 150 books, including the _Ripley's Believe It or Not!_ annuals, _The Mammoth Book of Weird News, Unbelievable Facts_ and _The Guinness Book of Oddities_. Among his claims to fame are having a rock band named after him by four people he has never met but who thought his name sounded memorable and once following former Liberal Party leader Jo Grimond up the escalator at London St. Pancras station.
To my bread knife and two bottles of water

## Introduction

If you ask someone outside London whether they regularly use Cockney rhyming slang, they might answer, 'Not on your Nellie!' – blissfully unaware that 'not on your Nellie' is itself a derivative of Cockney rhyming slang, from 'Nellie Duff' meaning 'puff', which is slang for 'life'. So 'not on your Nellie' means 'not on your life'.
The first mention of rhyming slang is in John Camden Hotten's 1859 book _The Slang Dictionary_ and the popularly held belief is that it was designed by criminals and shady street sellers as a secret code indecipherable to outsiders, especially the police. Over the next 100 years it was adopted by working-class Cockneys in general – often to provide euphemisms for embarrassing conditions or situations.
On the following pages you will find rhymes old and new, popular and obscure, and like any self-respecting dictionary there are translations from Cockney to English and vice versa. So if you want to know the contributions that such diverse characters as Sebastian Coe, Vera Lynn and Noddy Holder have made to the language, the meaning of quaint phrases like 'Oi Jimmy Knacker' and 'tumble down the sink', the answers are all in this, the ultimate Captain Hook about Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

_Geoff Tibballs_

## Cockney to English

### A

**Adam and Eve** believe
(One of the most familiar rhyming slang terms, dating from the late nineteenth century, as in, 'Would you Adam and Eve it, he's run off with my skin and blister!')

**Adam Ants** pants

**Air Force** sauce

**Air gunner** stunner

**Airs and graces** Epsom races, braces
(In the 1900s this term referred to Epsom races but it subsequently changed to mean the elastic straps that held up men's trousers.)

**Ajax** tax
(From the powerful household cleaner introduced in 1947 with the jingle: 'You'll stop paying the elbow tax/When you start cleaning with Ajax'.)

**Alan Whickers** knickers
(British TV personality famous for being lampooned on _Monty Python_ 's 'Whicker Island'. Usually shortened to 'Alans', as in the 1998 film _Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels_ when Nick the Greek says: 'Alright, alright, keep your Alans on!')

**Alderman's nail** tail
(As in the expression 'as happy as a dog with two aldermen'.)

**Alexander the Great** plate
(After the king of Macedonia (356–323 BC) who spectacularly expanded his empire during his short life.)

**Alfred the Great** weight
(After the ninth-century King of Wessex.)

**Alligator** later
(As in 'see you later, alligator' – with its response of 'in a while, crocodile'.)

**Almond rocks** socks

**Andy Pandy** shandy
(First appearing in 1950, stringed puppet Andy Pandy appeared on _Watch With Mother_ to the delight of thousands of pre-school children. (See also **Looby Loos**.))

**Apple fritter** bitter (beer)

**Apple pips** lips

**Apples and pears** stairs
(This phrase has its origins in the nineteenth century when market-stall holders would arrange their fruit in steps (or 'stairs') with the shiniest apples and pears at the front.)

**April Fools** tools, football pools
(This was originally an underworld term for a burglar's tools but it was later extended to embrace the craze for doing the football pools that took off in Britain in the 1930s.)

**April showers** flowers
(This probably stems from the verse 'April showers bring forth May flowers'.)

**Aristotle** bottle

**Armitage Shank** bank
(From toilet manufacturers Armitage Shanks.)

**Army and Navy** gravy

**Ascot races** braces
(Usually shortened to 'Ascots'.)

**Attila the Hun** a 2:1 degree result
(The fearsome king of the Huns (406–453) who died on his wedding night is fondly remembered by students, as in, 'Congratulations on getting an Attila; I only got a Desmond'.)

**Auntie Ella** umbrella

**Auntie Nelly** belly

### B

**Baa lamb** tram
(Electric baa lambs ran in London from 1901 to 1952 before being reintroduced in Croydon in 2000.)

**Babbling brook** cook, crook

**Baby's pram** jam

**Backseat driver** skiver

**Bacon and eggs** legs

**Bacon rind** mind

**Bag of sand** grand (£1,000)

**Bag of yeast** priest

**Baked bean** Queen (Elizabeth II)

**Baked beans** jeans
(Jeans were originally worn by cowboys, so this rhyme dating from the 1960s might spring from the association between a cowboy's favourite clothing and his favourite food.)

**Baker's dozen** cousin
(Medieval English bakers would add an extra loaf when selling a dozen in order to avoid being fined under the terms of the Assize of Bread and Ale for giving short measure.)

**Bald head** red (snooker ball)
(Applied to the red ball in snooker, even though a bald head looks more like the pink.)

**Ball and bat** hat
(Popular in England before 1914, after which it was largely replaced by 'Tit for tat'.)

**Ball of chalk** walk

**Ball of lead** head
(Used in the British army during the First World War but now obsolete.)

**Ballet dancer** chancer

**Balloon car** saloon bar

**Balmy breeze** cheese

**Band of Hope** soap
(The Band of Hope was a British temperance society formed in Leeds in 1847 to educate children on the perils of drink.)

**Bangers and mash** cash, slash (urinate)

**Bar of soap** Pope

**Barb wired** tired

**Barge and tug** mug (drinking)

**Bark and growl** trowel

**Barnaby Rudge** judge
(A historical novel by Charles Dickens, published in 1841 and dealing in part with the pitfalls of capital punishment. (See also **Dolly Varden**.))

**Barnet Fair** hair
(The history of Barnet Fair dates back to 1588 when Queen Elizabeth I granted a charter to the Lord of the Manor of Barnet, Charles Butler, for the staging of a twice-yearly fair.)

**Basil Fawlty** Balti
(After the Torquay hotelier played by John Cleese in the classic 1970s sitcom Fawlty Towers.)

**Bat and wicket** ticket

**Bath bun** son, sun

**Battle cruiser** boozer (pub)
(First heard in the 1940s. Barfly Jack in the 1998 gangster film _Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels_ , says: 'He's gone down the battle cruiser to watch the end of a football game'.)

**Battle of Waterloo** stew
(The Duke of Wellington's finest hour certainly left Napoleon in a stew.)

**Beano and Dandy** shandy
(The use of two children's comics in the rhyme underlines the belief that shandy is not a drink for real men.)

**Beans on toast** post

**Bear's paw** saw

**Bees and honey** money
(First recorded in 1892, the phrase may be comparing the industry of bees and humans, i.e. bees work hard to produce honey and if humans work hard, they earn money.)

**Bees' wax** tax

**Beggar My Neighbour** on the labour (exchange)
(The card game Beggar My Neighbour dates back to at least the mid-nineteenth century, having appeared in Charles Dickens's _Great Expectations_ (1861).)

**Bell ringers** fingers

**Benny Hill** till, drill
(The association with 'till' is particularly fitting as comedian Benny Hill (1926–92) was famously careful with money.)

**Bernie Flint** skint
(An alternative to 'boracic lint' from the mid-1970s when singer/guitarist Bernie Flint won the ITV talent show _Opportunity Knocks_ a record twelve times.)

**Bessie Braddock** haddock
(A former Labour MP for a Liverpool constituency, Bessie Braddock (1899–1970) was a big name in English politics after the Second World War.)

**Bethnal Greens** jeans
(From the area of East London, as in, 'Isn't it about time you bought a new pair of Bethnals?')

**Betty Grable** table
(US film star Betty Grable (1916–73) was famed for her shapely legs, which were insured for one million dollars.)

**Biffo the Bear** hair
(Biffo the Bear made his debut in the _Beano_ comic in 1948 and occupied the front cover until 1974 when he was ousted by Dennis the Menace.)

**Big bass drum** bum (bottom)

**Big Ben** ten

**Big dippers** slippers

**Big Ears and Noddy** body
(Big Ears the bearded gnome and Noddy were created by English writer Enid Blyton and first appeared in print in 1949.)

**Bill and Ben** ten
(Bill and Ben the Flowerpot Men were big hitters in 1950s children's television.)

**Bill Oddie and Ben** voddie (vodka)

**Bill Stickers** knickers
(Everyone's favourite victim from the omnipresent warning on walls or hoardings: 'Bill Stickers will be prosecuted'.)

**Billy Bunter** punter
(Created by Frank Richards, Billy Bunter of Greyfriars School was a popular character in the boys' weekly magazine _The Magnet_ , which was published from 1908 to 1940.)

**Billy Button** mutton
(The rhyme first appeared in the nineteenth century when 'Billy Button' was slang for an itinerant tailor.)

**Billy Liar** tyre
(The title of a 1959 novel by Keith Waterhouse, the story of 19-year-old undertaker's clerk Billy Fisher and his Walter Mitty-like fantasies.)

**Bin lid** quid (£1)

**Birdlime** time (prison sentence)
(Originating in the 1850s, it had been contracted to 'bird' by the 1920s. Hence the term 'to do bird' meaning 'to serve a prison sentence'.)

**Bird's nest** chest
(No doubt because a hairy chest resembles something that a sparrow has built.)

**Biscuits and cheese** knees

**Black and white** night

**Black Maria** fire
('Black Maria' was first heard in nineteenth-century America to describe a police van carrying prisoners.)

**Blackadder** ladder
(After Rowan Atkinson's social climber in the historical TV comedy that ran from 1983 to 1989.)

**Blackpool Tower** shower
(From the Lancashire tower (inspired by Paris's Eiffel Tower) that was completed in 1894.)

**Blackwall Tunnel** funnel
(After the tunnel under the Thames that opened in 1897. Seven people were killed during its construction.)

**Blindman's buff** snuff
(Blindman's buff is a children's game that dates back 2,000 years to Greece. In Germany it is called 'blind cow'.)

**Bloody Mary** scary
(Catholic Queen Mary I, who ruled England from 1553 to 1558, earned the nickname 'Bloody Mary' for her ruthless persecution of Protestants.)

**Blue moon** spoon

**Bo Diddley** tiddly
(After the American blues singer (1928–2008).)

**Bo Peep** sleep
(From the nursery rhyme character Little Bo Peep.)

**Board and plank** Yank

**Boat Race** face
(The University Boat Race was first staged in 1829 but it was not until after the Second World War that the term caught on as an expression for 'face'.)

**Bob Dylan** villain
(After the iconic US folk singer who sprang to fame in the 1960s.)

**Bobby Moore** score (£20)
(After England's World Cup-winning captain of 1966.)

**Bodie and Doyle** boil (spot)
(Played by Lewis Collins and Martin Shaw respectively, crimefighters Bodie and Doyle were characters in the ITV series _The Professionals_ , which ran from 1977 to 1983.)

**Boiled beef and carrot** claret (blood)
(In boxing 'claret' is a slang term for 'blood', and in rhyming slang that becomes 'boiled beef and carrot' after the Cockney music-hall song 'Boiled Beef And Carrots'.)

**Boiler house** spouse
(Hence the less than flattering description of 'er indoors as an 'old boiler'.)

**Boots and socks** pox

**Boracic lint** skint
(Boracic lint was a form of medical dressing popular in the nineteenth century. Just the word 'boracic' is sufficient to mean 'penniless'. First recorded in 1959.)

**Borrow and beg** egg
(Used during the Second World War when due to food shortages, eggs could often only be obtained by borrowing or begging.)

**Bottle and stopper** copper (police officer)

**Bottle of beer** ear

**Bottle of booze** news

**Bottle of cola** bowler (hat)

**Bottle of rum** bum (bottom)

**Bottle of sauce** horse

**Bottle of Scotch** watch

**Bottle of water** daughter

**Bottle of wine** fine (penalty)

**Bow and arrow** sparrow
('Who Killed Cock Robin?' asked the nursery rhyme, first published in 1744. 'I, said the sparrow, with my bow and arrow'. (See also **Sparrow**.))

**Bow and quiver** liver

**Bowl of fruit** suit

**Bowl the hoop** soup
(A favourite children's pastime in Victorian times – when soup kitchens for the poor were rife – was bowling an iron hoop along the street.)

**Box of toys** noise
(A late nineteenth-century rhyme probably inspired by the row made when a child delves into a box full of toys.)

**Bram Stoker** choker
(Irish writer (1847–1912) best known for creating Dracula, who in fairness was more a biter than a choker.)

**Brandy butter** nutter

**Brandy snap** slap

**Brass band** hand

**Brass tacks** facts
(The phrase 'Getting down to brass tacks' is believed to derive from the practice of nineteenth-century haberdashers who would measure material between brass tacks.)

**Bread and butter** nutter, gutter

**Bread and cheese** sneeze

**Bread and honey** money
('Bread' was first used as slang for 'money' in the 1940s and is also linked to other basic financial expressions, such as 'dough' and 'earning a crust'.)

**Bread and jam** tram
(A rhyme from the early twentieth century, reflecting the diet of that period.)

**Bread and lard** hard

**Bread knife** wife

**Brian O'Linn** gin
(A phrase so widespread that in the late nineteenth century it was often served in the shorter measure 'Brian'.)

**Bricks and mortar** daughter

**Bride and groom** broom, room

**Brighton line** nine
(The London to Brighton railway was opened in 1841, and in 1843 a third-class ticket from the capital to the coast cost 3s 6d.)

**Brixton riot** diet
(From the Brixton riots of 1981 which gave the government food for thought.)

**Brown Bess** yes
('Brown Bess' was the nickname for the British Army's land pattern musket, which was in use from around 1722 to 1838.)

**Brown bread** dead
(In the 1970s, this replaced 'loaf of bread' as the slang for 'deceased'.)

**Bruce Lee** key
(After the US-born martial arts actor (1940–73).)

**Bruno N'Gotty** totty
(French footballer who has played in England for Bolton Wanderers, Birmingham City and Leicester City.)

**Brussel sprout** Boy Scout, shout

**Bryant and Mays** stays
(An old type of corset rhymed with the well-known match manufacturers.)

**Bubble and squeak** beak (magistrate), speak

**Bubble gum** bum

**Buck and doe** snow

**Bucket afloat** coat

**Bucket and pail** jail
(A rhyme that depicts the act of slopping out. Usually shortened to 'bucket'.)

**Bugs Bunny** money
(The Warner Bros animated rabbit and lifelong nemesis of Elmer Fudd made his debut in 1939. He was voiced originally by Mel Blanc (1908–89), who famously disliked carrots.)

**Bull and cow** row (argument)
(Dates back to the nineteenth century and suggests matrimonial discord.)

**Bulldozer** poser

**Bunsen burner** nice little earner
(Named after the German chemist Robert Wilhelm Bunsen (1811–99), this phrase could be linked to 'bunce', a common term for money in the nineteenth century.)

**Burlington Bertie** thirty
('Burlington Bertie from Bow' was a popular music-hall song written in 1915 by William Hargreaves and often sung by his wife, Ella Shields, while dressed as a man.)

**Burnt cinder** window

**Bushel and peck** neck
(A bushel and a peck were old units of measurement, a bushel being eight imperial gallons and a peck equalling approximately nine litres.)

**Butcher's hook** look
(After the double-ended hook used by butchers for hanging up sides of meat and usually shortened to 'butcher's'.)

**Buttered bun** one

**Buttons and bows** toes
(From the 1947 Dinah Shore song 'Buttons And Bows', where, too, the title rhymed with 'toes'.)

### C

**Cab rank** bank

**Cain and Abel** table
(After the biblical sons of Adam and Eve.)

**Callard & Bowsers** trousers
(English confectionery company founded in 1837 and famous for its butterscotch. Usually shortened to 'Callards' in rhyming slang.)

**Camden Town** brown (halfpenny)
(In the nineteenth century copper coins were known as 'browns' and in the 1850s the humble halfpenny was rhymed with the north London district of Camden Town.)

**Can of Coke** joke

**Canal boat** Tote

**Canterbury Tales** Wales
(After the collection of stories written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the fourteenth century.)

**Captain Bligh** pie
(From William Bligh, British naval officer and captain of HMS _Bounty_ , whose crew mutinied in 1789.)

**Captain Cook** look
(Captain James Cook (1728–79) was the Yorkshire-born explorer who claimed the east coast of Australia for Britain.)

**Captain Hook** book
(The villain of J.M. Barrie's _Peter Pan_.)

**Captain Kirk** Turk, work
(The captain of the starship _Enterprise_ boldly entered the realms of rhyming slang in the 1990s.)

**Captain Morgan** organ (musical)
(Henry Morgan (1635–88) was a daring Welsh pirate.)

**Captain's log** bog (toilet)

**Car park** nark (police informant)

**Cardboard box** pox

**Carl Rosa** poser
(Carl Rosa (1842–89) founded an English opera company. He was a bit grand, which could have led to him being considered a poser in some circles.)

**Carlo Gatti** batty
(Swiss entrepreneur Carlo Gatti (1817–78) was supposedly the first man to make ice cream available to the general public.)

**Carving knife** wife

**Cash and carried** married

**Cat and mouse** house

**Cats and mice** dice

**Centre-half** scarf

**Chain and locket** pocket

**Chairman Mao** cow
(In vogue from 1966 when _Quotations From Chairman Mao Tse-Tung_ – otherwise known as _The Little Red Book_ – was published. It went on to sell 900 million copies worldwide.)

**Chalk Farm** arm
(The area of north London located on the Edgware arm of the Northern Line.)

**Charles James Fox** box (at the theatre)
(A theatre box has long been known as a 'Charles James' in memory of Charles James Fox (1749–1806), Whig politician and Britain's first foreign secretary.)

**Charlie Brown** clown
(From the 1959 song 'Charlie Brown' by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, which features the line, 'He's a clown, that Charlie Brown.' So nothing to do with _Peanuts_.)

**Charlie Chan** tan
(Charlie Chan appeared in over 40 films in the 1930s and 1940s (played in turn by Warner Oland, Sidney Toler and Roland Winters).)

**Charlie Drakes** brakes (on a vehicle)
(Born Charles Springall, diminutive British comedian Charlie Drake (1925–2006) was famous for his slapstick routines and 'Hallo, my darlings' catchphrase.)

**Charlie Mason** basin
(A late nineteenth-century rhyme, usually denoting an excessive amount rather than a porcelain container. 'He's had a Charlie Mason' meant 'He's had a basinful'.)

**Charlie Prescott** waistcoat
(Like Charlie Mason, nobody knows who Charlie Prescott was but it was a name that rhymed with 'wescot', as 'waistcoat' used to be pronounced.)

**Charlie Pride** ride
(A fictional character, not to be confused with US country music singer Charley Pride.)

**Charlie Smirke** berk
(Charlie Smirke (1906–93) was a British jockey who won eleven classics, including four Epsom Derbies.)

**Charlton Athletic** pathetic
(A rhyme no doubt devised by a Crystal Palace or Millwall fan.)

**Charm and flattery** battery

**Chas and Dave** shave
(Chas Hodges and Dave Peacock turned Cockney pub culture into a string of hits in the early 1980s, including 'Rabbit', the title of which comes from 'rabbit and pork'.)

**Cheddar cheese** keys

**Cheese grater** waiter

**Cheesy Quaver** favour, raver
(Quavers are a potato snack introduced by Walkers in the 1970s.)

**Cheltenham Gold** cold
(After steeplechasing's Cheltenham Gold Cup, first run in 1924.)

**Cherry hogs** dogs (greyhound racing)
(As in, 'I'm just going off to Walthamstow cherries'. A 'cherry hog' is an old term for a cherry stone.)

**Cherry pie** lie

**Cherry ripe** pipe
(From the nineteenth century, when cherrywood pipes were popular.)

**Chevy Chase** face
(After the American entertainer Cornelius ('Chevy') Crane Chase.)

**Chew the fat** chat
(The first known use of the phrase 'chew the fat' occurred in the 1885 book _Life in the Ranks of the British Army in India_ by J. Brunlees Patterson.)

**Chicken dinner** winner

**Chicken oriental** mental

**Chicken's neck** cheque

**Chimney and soot** foot

**China plate** mate
(As in, 'Good to see you, me old china.' First recorded in the 1880s, it acquired extensive use during the First World War.)

**Chip butty** nutty

**Chips and peas** knees

**Chitty Chitty Bang Bang** Cockney rhyming slang
(Cockney rhyming slang even has a rhyme of its own in the form of the title of the 1964 children's book written by James Bond creator Ian Fleming.)

**Chocolate éclair** prayer

**Chocolate fudge** judge

**Christmas cheer** beer

**Clickety click** sixty-six
(First used during the First World War when housie-housie, a forerunner of bingo, was played by the troops.)

**Clodhopper** copper (police officer)
(This term comes from the oversize boots associated with police officers.)

**Clothes pegs** legs

**Coalman's sack** black

**Coals and coke** broke (penniless)

**Coat and badge** cadge
(Doggett's Coat and Badge is the prize awarded to the winner of an annual rowing contest for apprentice Thames watermen held between London Bridge and Chelsea.)

**Coat hanger** clanger

**Cockaleekie** cheeky
(A traditional Scottish soup derived from the custom whereby the losing bird in a cockfight was plucked, dismembered, and tossed into a pot with several leeks.)

**Cock and hen** ten

**Cock sparrow** barrow

**Cocoa** say so
(As in, 'I should cocoa!')

**Coldstream Guards** cards (playing)

**Collar and tie** lie (untruth)

**Colonel Blimp** shrimp
(A cartoon character devised by David Low for the _Evening Standard_ in the 1930s, Colonel Blimp was the ultimate pompous, jingoistic Englishman.)

**Colonel Gaddafi** café
(The former leader of Libya was more accustomed to a Tripoli palace than a greasy spoon off the Balls Pond Road.)

**Comedy Dave** rave
('Comedy Dave' is the broadcasting name of David Vitty, who was the sidekick to Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles from 1998 to 2012.)

**Conan Doyle** boil (spot)
(After Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930), creator of Sherlock Holmes.)

**Conger eel** squeal (inform on)
(As in, 'If I ever find out who congered on me, he's brown bread'.)

**Constant screamer** concertina
(Echoing the painful sound that a concertina can make in the wrong hands.)

**Cooking fat** cat
(A spoonerism as well as rhyming slang.)

**Corn on the cob** job

**Corned beef** chief

**Corns and bunions** onions

**Cotton wool** pull (chat up)

**Cough and choke** smoke

**Council houses** trousers

**Country cousin** dozen

**Couple of bob** job
(The implication being that if you got a job, you'd earn some money – from the days when 'bob' was slang for 'shilling'.)

**Cow and calf** half (pint of beer)

**Cream cookie** bookie

**Cream crackered** knackered
('Knackered' derives from the knacker's yards of the mid-nineteenth century where old, worn-out horses were bought and slaughtered for their meat or hide.)

**Cribbage pegs** legs

**Crown Jewels** tools

**Crust of bread** head

**Currant bun** son, sun, _Sun_ newspaper
(When the _Sun_ 's owners, News International, launched free internet access via its website in 1999, they traded on the rhyming slang by calling it CurrantBun.com.)

**Custard and jelly** telly

**Custard creams** dreams

**Cuts and scratches** matches
(In the nineteenth century, poor-quality imported safety matches often cut and scratched the side of the box without igniting.)

**Cutty Sark** loan shark
(Built in 1869, the clipper _Cutty Sark_ stands in dry dock at Greenwich, where it is a familiar London landmark despite being badly damaged by fire in 2007.)

**Cynthia Payne** stain
(Cynthia Payne hit the headlines in 1978 when she was jailed for eighteen months for running a Streatham brothel, which became known as the 'House of Cyn'.)

### D

**Dad's Army** barmy
(Possibly inspired by the fact that in the Home Guard sitcom _Dad's Army_ (1968–77) Captain Mainwaring repeatedly referred to Private Pike as a 'stupid boy'.)

**Daffadown dilly** silly
(A daffadown dilly was a sixteenth-century name for a daffodil.)

**Daft and barmy** army

**Daily bread** head (of family)
(A phrase that became popular in the days when the head of the family was usually the breadwinner.)

**Daily Mail** ale, tale

**Daisy roots** boots
(In the 1960 hit 'My Old Man's A Dustman', Lonnie Donegan sang: 'He looks a proper 'nana in his great big hobnail boots/He's got such a job to pull 'em up that he calls 'em daisy roots.')

**Dan Dares** flares (trousers)
(Created by Frank Hampson for the _Eagle_ comic in 1950, Dan Dare was the ultimate space hero.)

**Dancing bears** stairs

**Dancing fleas** keys

**Darby Kelly (Kel)** belly
(As in the line from Harry Champion's song Boiled Beef And Carrots: 'That's the stuff for your Darby Kel, makes you fat and keeps you well'. (See also **Boiled beef and carrot**.))

**Date and plum** bum

**David Jason** mason
(English comedy actor who hit the big time in the 1980s as Del Boy Trotter in the BBC's _Only Fools and Horses_.)

**Davy Crockett** pocket
(The King of the Wild Frontier (1786–1836) serves as a macho alternative to Lucy Locket.)

**Day and night** light (ale)

**Dead loss** boss

**Deep fat fryer** liar

**Deep in debt** bet
(What you will be if you put too much on the wrong horse.)

**Deep sea diver** fiver

**Desmond (Tutu)** 2:2 (degree result)
(The South African clergyman and political activist came to prominence in the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid.)

**Desperate Dans** cans (headphones)
(The cowboy from Cactusville has been the mainstay of the _Dandy_ comic since 1937.)

**Diamond rocks** socks

**Diana Dors** drawers (knickers)
(Britain's blonde bombshell of the 1950s, actress Diana Dors (1931–84) was an obvious choice to represent knickers.)

**Dick Van Dyke** bike
(After the US actor forever remembered for putting on an awful Cockney accent as Bert the chimney sweep in the 1964 film _Mary Poppins_.)

**Dickory dock** clock
(A term taken from the nursery rhyme 'Hickory Dickory Dock', first published in 1744.)

**Dicky bird** word
(A familiar rhyming slang phrase, dating back to at least the 1930s.)

**Dicky dirt** shirt
(A 'dickey' was used to describe an old shirt as far back as 1781.)

**Didgeridoo** clue
(A didgeridoo is a wind instrument developed by Indigenous Australians.)

**Didn't ought** port (wine)

**Didn't oughta** water

**Ding dong** song

**Ding dong bell** hell
(From the sixteenth-century nursery rhyme that saw pussy suffer a hellish time in the well until being pulled out by little Tommy Stout.)

**Dinner plate** mate

**Dirty faces** laces

**Dixie Deans** jeans
('Dixie' was the nickname of footballer William Ralph Dean (1907–80) who acquired legendary status by scoring a record 60 League goals for Everton in one season, 1927–28.)

**Do me goods** Woods (Woodbines)
(Woodbines were a brand of cheap cigarettes popular during the First World War, when it was claimed that cigarettes were healthy.)

**Doctor and nurse** purse

**Dog and bone** phone
(First recorded in 1961, as in, 'Get on the dog and order us a Ruby'.)

**Dog and pup** cup

**Dog's meat** feet

**Dolly Varden** garden
(Dolly Varden was a character in _Barnaby Rudge_ by Charles Dickens, thus setting the rhyme in the mid-nineteenth century. (See also **Barnaby Rudge**.))

**Doner kebab** stab

**Donkey's ears** years
(The 'donkey's ears' rhyme was first recorded in 1916 but made way for the more familiar 'donkey's years' – meaning 'a long time' – in the 1920s.)

**Don't make a fuss** bus

**Doorknob** bob (shilling)

**Doris Day** gay (homosexual)
(From the US singer and actress who was popular in the 1950s and became a gay icon.)

**Dot and dash** moustache

**Doublet and hose** nose

**Doublet and hosed** closed

**Douglas Hurd** third (degree result)
(The former Conservative politician has been given a raw deal in being associated with a degree that nobody wants.)

**Dover boat** coat

**Dover harbour** barber

**Down the drain** brain

**Down the hatch** match
(The drinking phrase 'down the hatch' was first recorded in 1931 and its celebratory nature mirrors the euphoria felt when your football team has won its match.)

**Drum and fife** knife, wife
(A fife is a small flute used in conjunction with a drum in military music.)

**Drum roll** hole

**Dublin trick** brick
(Arising from the Irish association with labourers.)

**Duchess of Fife** wife
(Usually abbreviated to 'Dutch' and immortalised in Albert Chevalier's affectionate1893 song 'My Old Dutch'.)

**Duck and dive** jive

**Dudley Moores** sores
(After the English actor, comedian and musician (1935–2002).)

**Duke of York** chalk, fork, talk, walk

**Dunlop tyre** liar

**Dustbin lid** kid (child)

### E

**Earls Court** salt

**Early hours** flowers

**Earwig** twig

**East and west** chest, vest

**East India Docks** pox
(After London's Thames-side docks that were built in 1806 and closed in 1967.)

**Easter bunny** money

**Eau de Cologne** phone

**Edward Heath** teeth
(After the former Conservative Prime Minister (1916–2005).)

**Egg yolk** joke

**Eiffel Tower** shower

**Elephant's trunk** drunk

**Eliot Ness** mess
(A US federal agent based in Chicago, Eliot Ness (1903–57) was responsible for the downfall of mobster Al Capone.)

**Engelbert Humperdinck** drink
(Named after the sixties crooner born Arnold Dorsey.)

**Enoch Powell** towel
(From the controversial Conservative MP (1912–98), the towel perhaps being useful for wiping up the 'rivers of blood' that he predicted in his 1968 speech about immigration.)

**Errol Flynn** chin
(In memory of the swashbuckling, extrovert Australian movie star (1909–59), who took everything on the chin.)

**Everton toffee** coffee
(Everton toffee was first made in the suburb of Liverpool in the mid-eighteenth century.)

### F

**Fag packet** jacket

**False alarm** arm

**Fanny Cradock** haddock
(Cook Fanny Cradock (1909–94) was a television mainstay of the fifties and sixties.)

**Fat and wide** bride
(The school playground lyrics to Wagner's 'Bridal Chorus' from the opera _Lohengrin_ often contain the line, 'Here comes the bride – short, fat and wide'.)

**Field of wheat** street

**Fillet of plaice** face

**Fine and dandy** brandy

**Finger and thumb** mum, rum

**Fireman's hose** nose

**First-aid** blade (knife)
(A dark rhyme, the former suggesting the results of an attack with the latter.)

**Fish and tank** bank

**Fish hook** book

**Fisherman's daughter** water

**Five to twos** shoes
(Possibly derived from the angle of a person's feet while standing.)

**Fleas and ants** pants

**Flounder and dab** cab

**Flowery dell** cell (prison)
(An ironic rhyme dating back to the 1920s and usually shortened to 'flowery'.)

**Fly-by-nights** tights

**Fly tipper** nipper (child)

**Fore and aft** daft

**Forsyte Saga** lager
(Inspired by the1967 BBC adaptation of John Galsworthy's novel, the show proved so popular that pubs in Britain were deserted on Sunday nights during its 26-week run.)

**Fortnum & Mason** basin
(After the up-market Piccadilly department store founded in 1707 and renowned for its luxury food hampers.)

**Frankie Fraser** razor
(After London underworld figure 'Mad' Frankie Fraser who was not averse to using a razor on his victims.)

**Frankie Howerd** coward
(After comedian Frankie Howerd (1917–92).)

**Fred Astaire** hair
(Based on the immaculately groomed US actor and dancer (1899–1987) whose real name was Frederick Austerlitz.)

**Fridge freezer** geezer

**Frog and toad** road
(First recorded in the 1850s, usually shortened to 'frog'.)

**Frog in the throat** boat

**Fruit and nuts** guts

**Fruit Gum** chum
(Almost certainly stemming from the 1950s TV commercials for Rowntree's Fruit Gums where a small boy pleaded, 'Don't forget the Fruit Gums, Chum'.)

**Frying pan** old man (husband or father)

**Funny feeling** ceiling

### G

**Game of nap** cap
(Nap – short for Napoleon – was a popular card game around the turn of the twentieth century.)

**Garden fence** dense
(No doubt arising from the phrase 'thick as two short planks'.)

**Garden gate** magistrate, eight

**Garden gnome** comb

**Garden plant** aunt

**Garden tool** fool

**Gates of Rome** home

**Gay Gordon** traffic warden
(Based on the nineteenth-century Scottish country dance called the Gay Gordons.)

**Geoff Hurst** first (degree result), thirst
(It is only proper that England's hat-trick hero of the 1966 World Cup final should be associated with excellence.)

**Geoffrey Chaucer** saucer
(After the English poet (1340–1400), author of _The Canterbury Tales_.)

**George and Ringo** bingo
(After George Harrison and Ringo Starr of Beatles fame.)

**George Bernard Shaw** door
(From the name of the Irish playwright (1856–1950), as in the Larry Grayson catchphrase, 'Shut that George Bernard!')

**George Blake** snake
(An appropriate rhyme for Englishman George Blake (1922–94), who in 1961 was exposed as a double agent and convicted of spying for the Soviet Union.)

**George Melly** belly
(Named after the ample stomach of the jazzman, broadcaster and general _bon viveur_ (1926–2007).)

**George Raft** draught
(From the American tough-guy movie star (1895–1980), as in, 'Can you feel the George Raft in here?')

**German band** hand
('German band' was the name given to groups of strolling musicians that used to play in the streets of London and other major cities in the early twentieth century.)

**Gerry Cottle** bottle
(Named after the aspiring juggler who ran away to join the circus at the age of fifteen in 1961 and was running his own circus within ten years.)

**Gert and Daisy** lazy
(Popular Cockney characters from 1930s and 1940s radio created by comedy double act Elsie (1895–1990) and Doris (1904–78) Waters.)

**Gertie Gitana** banana
(Gertie Gitana (1888–1957) was a music-hall singer from the early twentieth century.)

**Gilbey's gin** chin
(The name 'Gilbey's' has been seen on bottles of gin since 1872, its London dry gin being a particular favourite.)

**Ginger ale** jail

**Giraffe** laugh
(As in, 'Is he having a giraffe?')

**Girl and boy** toy

**Girls and boys** noise

**Give and take** cake

**Glasgow Ranger** stranger

**Glass of beer** ear

**Glass of plonk** conk (nose)

**Glenn Hoddle** doddle
(From the gifted footballer who found his short reign as England manager anything but a doddle.)

**God almighty** nightie

**God forbid** kid (child)
(From the early twentieth century and apparently inspired by the lament of an impoverished man at the prospect of yet another mouth to feed.)

**Gold watch** Scotch (whisky)
(This nineteenth-century rhyme surely stems from the colour of whisky.)

**Golden Hind** blind
(After the name of the ship in which Sir Francis Drake sailed around the world between 1577 and 1580.)

**Goldilocks** pox

**Gone to bed** dead

**Goodie and baddie** paddy (Irishman)

**Goose's neck** cheque

**Gooseberry puddin'** woman
(A twentieth-century term whereby a man might refer to his wife as his 'old gooseberry'.)

**Granny's wrinkles** winkles

**Grape vine** clothes line

**Grass in the park** nark (police informant)
(A rhyme that uses the 1930s term 'grass' for 'informant' (probably from 'snake in the grass') to link up with 'nark', which dates back to the mid-nineteenth century.)

**Grasshopper** copper (police officer)

**Greengages** wages
(First recorded in 1931 and often shortened to 'greens', a colour associated with money not least because pound notes were green.)

**Greens and brussels** muscles
(A rhyme originating from the belief that eating your greens helps build up muscles.)

**Grey mare** fare
(Originating from the days of nineteenth-century horse-drawn transport.)

**Grumble and mutter** flutter (bet)

**Guinea pig** wig

### H

**Haddock and bloater** motor

**Hail and rain** train

**Hairy knees** please

**Hale and hearty** party

**Half a crown** brown (snooker ball)
(A half-crown was worth two shillings and sixpence (12½p) until the coin was discontinued in 1967.)

**Half a nicker** vicar
(In Cockney slang a 'nicker' was £1, so in old money 'half a nicker' was ten shillings (or 50p in today's terms).)

**Half and half** scarf

**Half-inch** pinch (steal)
(First recorded in 1925, as in, 'Who's half-inched me half and half?')

**Half-ounce** bounce (a cheque)
(The common factor in this rhyme is a short measure.)

**Half-ouncer** bouncer (doorman)

**Halfpenny dip** ship
(A London dockers' rhyme from the mid-nineteenth century, referring to a halfpenny lucky dip in a sweet shop.)

**Halfpenny stamp** tramp

**Ham and cheesy** easy

**Ham shanks** Yanks (Americans)

**Hammer and discus** whiskers

**Hampstead Heath** teeth
(Usually shortened to 'Hampsteads', this term was first recorded in 1887.)

**Hands and feet** meat

**Hanger Lane** pain
(Meaning a 'pain in the neck', which the infamous Hanger Lane gyratory system, introduced in the 1970s, certainly is. In 2007 it was named Britain's scariest road junction.)

**Hank Marvin** starvin'
(After the Shadows' guitarist Hank Marvin (born Brian Robson Rankin).)

**Hansel and Gretel** kettle
(The two young heroes of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale cooked the wicked witch in her own oven.)

**Harbour light** right

**Hard labour** neighbour

**Hare and hound** round (of drinks)

**Harold Macmillan** villain
(The Conservative politician (1894–1986) who, as Prime Minister, sacked seven members of his cabinet during the 'Night of the Long Knives' in July 1962.)

**Harold Pinter** splinter
(From the renowned English playwright.)

**Harry Lime** time
(Harry Lime was the enigmatic central character in Graham Greene's 1950 novel _The Third Man_. In the film version Lime was played by Orson Welles.)

**Harvey Nichols** pickles
(In honour of the upmarket department store founded in 1813 by Benjamin Harvey as a linen shop in London's Knightsbridge.)

**Has beens** greens (vegetables)

**Hat and coat** boat

**Hat and feather** weather

**Hat and scarf** bath

**Hattie Jacques** the shakes
(Comedy actress (1922–80) best known for playing Eric Sykes's sister in his long-running TV series and for appearing in fourteen _Carry On_ films.)

**Heap of coke** bloke
(From the days when London homes had coal fires, sometimes shortened to 'heapy'.)

**Heaven and hell** smell

**Heavenly bliss** kiss

**Hedge and ditch** pitch

**Henry Fonda** Honda
(The US actor (1905–82) gave his name to the Honda 90 motorbike on which many aspiring taxi drivers toured the streets of London learning 'The Knowledge'.)

**Herbie Hides** strides (trousers)
(British boxer Herbie Hide was twice WBO heavyweight champion in the 1990s. 'Strides' has been a colloquialism for 'trousers' since the start of the twentieth century.)

**Here and there** chair

**Herring and kipper** stripper

**Hey diddle diddle** fiddle
(Inspired by the eighteenth-century nursery rhyme and the increasing use of the word 'diddle' to mean 'cheat'.)

**Hide and seek** cheek (nerve)

**Highland fling** ring, king (in playing cards)

**Hit and miss** kiss
(Popular from the early 1960s, possibly inspired by the 'hit' or 'miss' cards held up by panellists on BBC television's _Juke Box Jury_.)

**Hokey-cokey** karaoke
(The hokey-cokey is a song and dance that originated in England during the early 1940s. Karaoke – meaning 'empty orchestra' – started in Japan in the 1970s.)

**Holy Ghost** post (mail), toast

**Honey bees** keys

**Horn of Plenty** twenty
(In Greek mythology the Horn of Plenty was the name given to a goat's horn filled with fruit and an abundance of other appetising foodstuffs.)

**Horse and carriage** garage

**Horse and trough** cough
(Usually shortened to 'horse', whose similarity to 'hoarse' makes it suitable for a throaty rhyme.)

**Horses and carts** darts

**Hot beef** stop thief
(The word 'beef' has been used as a rhyme for 'thief' since at least the 1740s and in the nineteenth century 'hot beef' became the accepted Cockney cry aimed at a fleeing felon.)

**Hot cross bun** nun
(The cross on the bun is a symbol of the crucifixion (they are traditionally eaten on Good Friday).)

**Hot dinner** winner

**Hot potato** waiter
(A rhyme aided by the Cockney pronunciation 'potater'.)

**House of Lords** cords (corduroy trousers)

**Housemaid's knee** sea

**How's your father?** lather (state)
(As in, 'Just because I was a few minutes late he was in a right how's your father'.)

**Huckleberry Hound** pound
(Created by Hanna-Barbera and voiced by Daws Butler, Huckleberry Hound had his own TV cartoon show from 1958, supported by Yogi Bear and Pixie and Dixie.)

**Hugs and kisses** missus (wife)

**Hundred to thirty** dirty
(From horse-race betting odds, a shade over three to one.)

**Hurricane lamp** tramp

### I

**I suppose** nose
(First recorded in the 1850s, as in, 'What's that hanging from his I suppose?')

**In and out** gout

**In the mood** food

**Incredible Hulk** sulk
(Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby for _Marvel Comics_ in 1962, Dr Bruce Banner is a scientist who, whenever he gets really angry, is transformed into the Incredible Hulk.)

**Inky blue** flu

**Inky smudge** judge

**Irish jig** wig
(First used in the 1970s and generally shortened to 'Irish'.)

**Irish stew** true

**Iron girder** murder

**Iron tank** bank

**Isle of Wight** right

**Itchy teeth** beef

**Ivory pearl** girl
(As in, 'Diamonds are an ivory's best friend'.)

### J

**Jabba the Hutt** shut
(In honour of the obese, slug-like creature from _Star Wars_.)

**Jack and Dandy** handy

**Jack and Jill** hill

**Jack in the box** pox

**Jack Jones** on your own
(This rhyme originated during the First World War, as in, 'Now his hugs and kisses has left him, he's all on his Jack Jones.')

**Jack Ketch** stretch
(Jack Ketch was an English executioner of the seventeenth century, whose attention was therefore even less welcome to a convicted felon than a prison sentence or 'stretch'.)

**Jack of Spades** shades (sunglasses)

**Jack Sprat** brat, fat
(Named after the world's most incompatible eaters – 'Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean'.)

**Jack tar** bar
(A 'jack tar' is an old name for a sailor – derived from the tar with which sailors used to waterproof their trousers in the eighteenth century.)

**Jack the Lad** bad
(The original Jack the Lad was an eighteenth-century thief called Jack Sheppard.)

**Jack the Ripper** kipper
(The way in which a herring is sliced open is eerily reminiscent of the manner in which the 1888 Whitechapel serial killer slit open his victims.)

**Jack the Rippers** slippers

**Jackanory** story
(In rhyming slang 'jackanory' refers to a tall story (basically a lie) rather than the sort of tale read by Bernard Cribbins and co. on the BBC children's series _Jackanory_ (1965–96).)

**Jacket and vest** West (End of London)
(As in, 'He must have something up his sleeve because he's going up the jacket this afternoon'.)

**Jackie Chan** plan
(After the Chinese martial arts actor.)

**Jam roll** parole, the dole

**Jam tart** heart

**Jamaica rum** thumb

**James Dean** keen
(US actor (1931–55) whose premature death in a car crash proved a shrewd career move.)

**James Hunt** front (nerve)
(From the courageous and outspoken British racing driver (1947–93), as in, 'You ain't 'alf got some James Hunt!')

**Jamjar** car
(Originating in the 1930s, the term has achieved such widespread acceptance that the UK's biggest online new car dealer is called jamjar.com.)

**Jean Michel Jarre** bar
(The first two-thirds of the French composer's name are also used to refer to a 'jar' (a pint glass) of beer. So you could order a Jean Michel while standing at the Jean Michel.)

**Jeff Beck** cheque
(A 1970s rhyme based on the influential English rock guitarist, formerly with The Yardbirds.)

**Jeffrey Dahmer** charmer
(A rhyme laden with irony to describe the cannibalistic US serial killer (1960–94) who was anything but a charmer.)

**Jekyll and Hydes** strides (trousers)
(From Robert Louis Stevenson's character with the split personality, usually shortened in rhyming slang to 'jekylls'.)

**Jellied eel** deal

**Jellied eels** wheels (transport)
(As in, 'How are you getting home? Have you got jellied eels?')

**Jelly bone** phone

**Jelly tot** spot

**Jet fighter** all nighter

**Jimi Hendrix** appendix
(From the US rock guitarist (1942–70).)

**Jimmy Cliff** whiff
(Based on the Jamaican reggae singer who enjoyed UK chart success in the late 1960s and early 1970s.)

**Jimmy Connors** honours
(As in, 'Will you do the Jimmy Connors, mate?')

**Jimmy Greaves** thieves
(As the outstanding goal poacher of his generation, footballer Jimmy Greaves scored over 350 goals between 1957 and 1971.)

**Jimmy Hill** chill
(After the veteran footballer and broadcaster, as in, 'There's a bit of a Jimmy Hill in the air today.')

**Jimmy Logie** bogey
('Snot much fun for the Arsenal footballer (1919–84) being rhymed with nasal mucus.)

**Jimmy Riddle** piddle
(First recorded in the 1930s and has become a universal byword for bladder-emptying. Sometimes shortened to just 'Jimmy', as in, 'Get 'em in while I go for a quick Jimmy.')

**Joan of Arc** lark
(The name of the saint and French heroine (c.1412–31) is mainly evoked in a sense of exasperation, as in, 'Blow this for a Joan of Arc!')

**Joanna** piano
(First recorded in 1846 and still going strong, 'joanna' is very much a Cockney knees-up piano.)

**Jockey's whip** kip (sleep)

**Jockeys' whips** chips

**Joe Baksi** taxi
(A US heavyweight boxer (1922–77), Baksi's name was frequently used as rhyming slang in Irvine Welsh's book _Trainspotting_.)

**Joe Blake** steak

**Joe O'Gorman** foreman

**John Bull** on the pull
(A symbol of British nationalism, John Bull was created by Dr John Arbuthnot in 1712.)

**John Cleese** cheese
(The comedy actor's family name was actually Cheese until his father changed it in 1915.)

**John O'Groats** oats
(As in, 'Look at the smile on his face – you can tell he's been getting his John O'Groats lately.')

**John Wayne** train
(The US Western actor (1907–79) was more familiar with a wagon train than the 8.25 from Dartford to Charing Cross.)

**John West** very best
(From the fish producer whose TV adverts proclaimed that only the best was good enough for John West.)

**Johnnie Walker** talker
(The rhyme is based on the brand of whisky, dating from the nineteenth century, the implication being that too much of it loosens your tongue.)

**Johnny Horner** corner
(Dating from the late nineteenth century when pubs were invariably situated on street corners, so 'going round the Johnny' meant going for a pint.)

**Jolly joker** poker

**Jolly Roger** lodger
(Taken from the popular term for a pirate's flag that was first coined in the early eighteenth century and emphasising the commonly held view that lodgers weren't to be trusted.)

**Judge Dredd** head
(The law enforcer who first featured in the sci-fi comic _2000 AD_ in 1977.)

**Julius Caesar** geezer
(The distinguished Roman statesman (100–44 BC) might not have been too impressed had Brutus and Cassius referred to him as a 'geezer'.)

### K

**Kate and Sidney** steak and kidney
(A partial spoonerism dating from the early twentieth century.)

**Keith Moon** loon
(Keith Moon (1947–78) was the wildman drummer of The Who, his erratic behaviour earning the nickname 'Moon the loon'.)

**Ken Dodd** wad
(When the Liverpudlian comedian was charged with tax evasion in 1989, it was revealed that he kept a sizeable wad of money stashed in suitcases in his attic.)

**Kermit the frog** bog (toilet)

**Kettle and hob** fob (watch)

**Kick and prance** dance

**Kidney punch** lunch

**King Canutes** boots
(An early twentieth-century rhyme based on the Danish king of England (reign 1016–35).)

**King dick** thick (stupid)

**King Lears** ears

**Kingdom come** bum

**Kings and queens** baked beans

**Kipper and bloater** photo

**Kipper and plaice** face
(Another rhyme exploiting the common insult 'fish face'.)

**Kiss and cuddle** muddle

**Kitchen sink** clink (jail), drink

**Kitty litter** bitter (beer)

**Knobbly knees** keys
(In the 1950s many Londoners spent their summer break at the coast. While the girls took part in beauty contests, the male equivalent was the knobbly knees contest.)

**Knock at the door** four

**Knocker and knob** job
(Possibly inspired by the old practice of going from door to door in search of work.)

**Kuala Lumpur** jumper
(A rhyme based on the capital of Malaysia.)

**Kung fu fighter** cigarette lighter

### L

**La-di-da** cigar
(First recorded in 1977, a clear reference to the perceived superior social standing of cigar smokers.)

**Lady Godiva** fiver
(According to legend, Lady Godiva, the wife of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, rode naked through the streets of Coventry in the eleventh century to persuade her husband to lower taxes.)

**Lady in silk** milk

**Lager and lime** time

**Lager lout** kraut (German)
(A 1990s insult for the nation that brews arguably the best lager in the world.)

**Lambeth Walk** chalk
(Written by Douglas Furber and Noel Gay, 'The Lambeth Walk' was a song-and-dance number from the 1937 musical _Me and My Girl_.)

**Larry Grayson** Mason
(From the camp comic (1923–95) whose catchphrase 'Shut that door' and unseen friend Everard helped propel him to national prominence in the 1970s.)

**Last card of the pack** the sack
(A rhyme inspired by the expression 'getting your cards', meaning 'to get the sack'.)

**Laugh and joke** smoke (cigarette)
(A rhyme that was popular in the first half of the twentieth century when men and women would gather for a laugh and joke while enjoying a smoke.)

**Laugh and titter** bitter (beer)

**Left and right** fight
(A neat rhyme conjuring up images of blows in a boxing match.)

**Left in the lurch** church
(A nineteenth-century phrase that must have been particularly poignant for any bride left waiting at the altar.)

**Leg of beef** thief

**Lemon and lime** crime

**Lemon drop** cop (police officer)

**Lemon squeezer** geezer

**Lemon squeezy** easy
(As in the familiar children's rhyme 'easy peasy lemon squeezy'.)

**Lemon tart** smart

**Len Hutton** button
(From the Yorkshire and England batsman (1916–90) who captained his country in the 1950s.)

**Lester Piggott** bigot
(Famously monosyllabic British jockey who rode over 5,000 winners, including nine Epsom Derbies, and served a jail sentence in 1987 for tax evasion.)

**Life and death** breath

**Lilley and Skinner** beginner
(After the British shoe manufacturers founded in 1835.)

**Lillian Gish** fish
(Hollywood actress (1893–1993) who began her career in 'the silents' and made her final film in 1987 at the age of 93.)

**Limehouse Cut** gut (paunch)
(The oldest canal in London, the Limehouse Cut provides a short cut from the Thames at Limehouse Basin to the River Lee Navigation.)

**Linen draper** newspaper
(Dating from the nineteenth century and usually shortened to 'linen'.)

**Lion's lair** chair
(This twentieth-century rhyme is based on the notion that the head of the house has his favourite chair and that it is unwise – dangerous even – for anyone else to attempt to sit in it.)

**Lion's roar** snore

**Lionel Blair** chair

**Lionel Blairs** flares (trousers)
(After the happy hoofer who carried off the seventies fashions with more style than most.)

**Little brown jug** plug
(Derived from the 1869 song 'Little Brown Jug' by Joseph Winner that was popularised 70 years later by Glenn Miller.)

**Little Nell** bell
(From the tragic character in Charles Dickens's _Old Curiosity Shop_. The term is usually applied to a doorbell, as in, 'Who's that ringing on the Little Nell at this hour?')

**Little Red Riding Hoods** stolen goods
(From the Brothers Grimm fairytale.)

**Little Tich** itch
(Little Tich was the stage name of 4ft 6in music-hall comedian Harry Relph (1867–1928) whose most celebrated routine was his Big Boot Dance.)

**Loaf of bread** head
(Always shortened to 'loaf', as in the familiar expression 'use your loaf' (meaning 'be sensible'), which first appeared in print in 1938.)

**Lollipop** shop
(This can be used in the sense of 'to inform on' as well as to denote a retail outlet.)

**London Bridge** fridge
(A bridge has existed at or near the present site for nearly 2,000 years. The current London Bridge – at least the seventh – was opened in 1973.)

**London fog** dog
(When householders burned coal fires, dense fogs – or pea soupers or smogs as they became known – hung ominously over London for days at a time.)

**London taxi** jacksie (backside)

**Long Acre** baker
(A rhyme first recorded in the nineteenth century and named after the street near Covent Garden.)

**Looby Loos** shoes
(After the doll in the 1950s children's TV series _Andy Pandy_ , as in, 'Check out the new Loobies'.)

**Loop the loop** soup

**Lord and mastered** plastered (drunk)

**Lord Lovell** shovel
(The rhyme has its origins among nineteenth-century sailors although nobody is sure which of the many Lord Lovells it actually concerns.)

**Lord Mayor** swear
(Perhaps because the Lord Mayor of London has to swear allegiance to the sovereign.)

**Lord of the Manor** tanner (sixpence)
(Introduced in 1551, the sixpence – nicknamed a 'tanner' and the equivalent of 2½p – continued in circulation until decimalisation in 1971.)

**Lords and peers** ears

**Lorna Doone** spoon
(Inspired by the heroine of Exmoor from the 1869 novel _Lorna Doone_ by R. D. Blackmore.)

**Lost and found** pound

**Love and kisses** missus

**Lucky charm** arm

**Lucky dip** chip, kip (sleep)

**Lucy Locket** pocket
(From the nineteenth-century nursery rhyme: 'Lucy Locket lost her pocket'.)

**Lump of ice** advice

**Lump of lead** head

### M

**Macaroni** pony (£25)
(A 'macaroni' was an eighteenth-century English term for a dandy. The rhyme with 'pony' stems from the song 'Yankee Doodle', a British jibe at US fashions. (See also **Yankee Doodles**.))

**Mackerel and sprat** prat

**Mae West** best, chest
(After the American actress (1893–1980) whose chest was so admired by Allied soldiers during the Second World War that they called their inflatable life jackets 'Mae Wests' because the shape reminded them of her generous bosom.)

**Magistrate's court** short (drink)
(Probably a warning as to where you are likely to end up if you drink too many shorts.)

**Mahatma Gandhi** brandy
(Named after the Indian nationalist leader and teetotaller (1869–1948).)

**Major Stevens** evens (betting odds)
(A fictitious character to describe a situation when the odds are one to one or fifty-fifty.)

**Man alive** five

**Man and wife** knife

**Man on the moon** spoon

**Manfred Mann** plan
(South African-born keyboard player whose band had a string of hits in the 1960s, including 'Do Wah Diddy Diddy' and 'Pretty Flamingo'.)

**Mangle and wringer** singer
(A mangle and wringer was a common sight in British households before the advent of washing machines in the late 1950s.)

**Manhole cover** brother
(A partly anatomical expression to rhyme with the Cockney 'bruvver'.)

**Marbles and conkers** bonkers

**Margate sands** hands

**Marie Corelli** telly
(An early rhyme for television taken from the pseudonym of the British romantic novelist Mary Mackay (1855–1924).)

**Marquis de Sade** hard
(French aristocrat and writer (1740–1814) whose pleasure at inflicting pain on others gave rise to the term 'sadism'.)

**Mars bar** scar
(Introduced in 1932, the phrase entered Cockney rhyming slang in the 1970s, chiefly to denote the sort of scar received in a gang fight.)

**Maud and Ruth** truth

**Merry-go-round** pound
(Suggesting the circulation of currency.)

**Merry old soul** coal
(From the eighteenth-century nursery rhyme 'Old King Cole', who was a merry old soul.)

**Mexican wave** shave
(The ultimate sign of spectator boredom at a sporting event first manifested itself at the 1986 Mexico World Cup.)

**Michael Caine** pain, stain
(The actor's London roots – in his youth he worked as a porter at Smithfield meat market – make him a natural for Cockney rhyming slang.)

**Michael Winner** dinner
(A simple rhyme for the food critic and _bon viveur_.)

**Mickey Duff** rough
(The British boxing promoter's battered face is testament to his own pugilistic past.)

**Mickey Monk** drunk

**Mickey Mouse** house

**Mickey Mouser** Scouser
(Since his debut in 1928, the Walt Disney rodent's name has come to be a colloquialism for 'substandard' or 'amateurish'.)

**Mickie Most** toast
(After the record producer (1938–2003) who brought the world Suzi Quatro and was a regular judge on the 1970s TV talent show _New Faces_.)

**Mile End** friend
(From the area of East London that gets its name because it is one mile east of the boundary of the City of London.)

**Mince pies** eyes
(First recorded in 1857 and generally shortened to 'minces'.)

**Moan and wail** jail

**Moby Dick** sick
(From the fearsome great white whale in the 1851 novel _Moby Dick_ by Herman Melville.)

**Mona Lisa** pizza
(One Italian work of art representing another even though Leonardo Da Vinci probably never envisaged _La Gioconda_ with an anchovy topping.)

**Monkey's tail** nail

**Monty's army** barmy
(The troops in question were those commanded by General Montgomery in the Second World War.)

**Morecambe and Wise** flies
(Eric Morecambe (1926–84) and Ernie Wise (1925–99) were a much-loved comedy double act for 43 years.)

**Moriarty** party
(It seems unlikely that the Moriarty in question is either Sherlock Holmes's arch enemy, Professor Moriarty, or Spike Milligan's Count Jim Moriarty from _The Goon Show_.)

**Mortar and trowel** towel

**Mother Goose** loose
(Thought to be based on Bertha _pied d'oie_ (Goose-foot Bertha), wife of King Robert II who ruled France from 996 to 1031.)

**Mother Hubbard** cupboard
(From the sad tale – first published in 1805 – of Old Mother Hubbard who went to the cupboard to fetch her poor dog a bone, only to find that the shelves were bare.)

**Mother-in-law** saw
(No doubt stemming from the fact that one has a sharp tongue and the other has sharp teeth.)

**Mother of pearl** girl

**Mother's pride** bride

**Mrs Moore** floor
(From the character in the 1926 Harry Castling and James Walsh comic song 'Don't Have Any More, Mrs Moore'.)

**Mrs Mopp** shop
(A 1940s expression taken from the charlady character in the radio comedy _ITMA_ – 'It's That Man Again' – a reference to Hitler.)

**Muddy trench** the bloody French
(A rhyme dug out in the trenches of the First World War.)

**Mum and Dad** mad

**Murray Mint** skint
(A line of confectionery that became part of popular culture in the late 1950s thanks to a series of amusing TV commercials.)

**Murray Walker** talker
(If ever a rhyme suited a celebrity, it is to label the veteran motor racing commentator a 'talker'. Motormouth Murray was never at a loss for words.)

**Mustard and cress** dress

**Muswell Hill** bill
(From the district of north London, as in, 'Oi, cheese grater, can I have the Muswell?')

**Mutter and stutter** butter

**Myrna Loy** saveloy
(Actress Myrna Loy (1905–93) was voted 'Queen of Hollywood' in 1938.)

### N

**Nanny goat** coat, throat
(Usually abbreviated to 'nanny', as in, 'I've got a frog in my nanny'.)

**Nat King Cole** the dole
(From the unforgettable American singer (1919–65), as in, 'Are you gonna spend your entire life on the Nat King Cole?')

**Needle and pin** gin, thin

**Needle and thread** bread

**Needles and pins** twins
(As in, 'Congratulations, you've got needles!')

**Nell Gwynn** gin
(Charles II's mistress (1650–87) was famed for selling oranges, which just happen to go very nicely with gin.)

**Nellie Deans** greens

**Nellie Duff** puff (life)
(This rhyme is the origin of the phrase 'not on your nellie', first heard in the 1940s and meaning 'not on your life', since 'puff' is slang for 'life'.)

**Nelson Eddys** readies (cash)
(From American singer Nelson Eddy (1901–67).)

**Nelson Riddle** piddle
(A wee honour for the US composer and orchestra leader (1921–85).)

**Nervo and Knox** goggle box (TV)
(Although mainly at home on the stage, Crazy Gang duo Jimmy Nervo (1890–1975) and Teddy Knox (1896–1974) made occasional appearances on the 'goggle box'.)

**Nervous wreck** cheque
(A rhyme drawing on the emotions felt while waiting for a large payment to arrive in the post.)

**New Delhi** belly
(This term is derived from the rush of diarrhoea known as 'Delhi belly' that sometimes results from eating poorly prepared Indian food on the sub-continent.)

**Newgate Gaol** tale
(The tale in question is the type of hard-luck yarn that might be spun by a prisoner. Newgate jail operated for over 700 years on the site of what is now the Old Bailey.)

**Nigel Mansell** cancel
(After the 1992 Formula One world champion.)

**Night and day** grey

**Night Boat to Cairo** giro
('Night Boat To Cairo' was the title track of the 1979 debut album by Madness, and 'giro' is a slang term for 'the dole'.)

**No surrenders** suspenders

**Noah's Ark** lark, nark (informant), park

**Noddy Holders** shoulders
(After the singer with 1970s band Slade.)

**North and south** mouth
(Cockney singer Tommy Steele's 1960 recording 'What a Mouth' contained the lines: 'What a mouth, what a mouth, what a north and south, Blimey what a mouth he's got!')

**Nose and chin** win
(The abbreviated version 'nose' may be the basis of the expression 'on the nose', a horse-racing term describing a bet laid for a win only rather than each way.)

**Nuclear sub** pub

**Nursery rhymes** _The Times_
(A whimsical rhyme linking a children's pursuit with arguably Britain's most grown-up newspaper.)

### O

**Obi-Wan Kenobi** mobi (mobile phone)
(After the Jedi Master from _Star Wars_.)

**Ocean liner** shiner (black eye)

**Ocean wave** shave

**Oi Jimmy Knacker** tobacco
(Oi Jimmy Knacker was a children's street game similar to leapfrog that was popular in London in the 1920s. The rhyme works because of the Cockney pronunciation 'tabakker'.)

**Old fogey** bogey (snot)

**Old iron and brass** grass
(From the rag and bone man's collection call of 'any old iron', popularised by the 1911 music-hall song of that title performed by Harry Champion.)

**Old King Cole** the dole

**Old oak** the Smoke (London)
('The Smoke' has been London's nickname from the nineteenth century on account of its polluted atmosphere from homes and factories.)

**Omar Sharif** grief
(After the smooth Egyptian actor, as in, 'Will you stop giving me so much Omar!')

**On and off** cough

**On the floor** poor
(A rhyme reflecting where you might end up sleeping if you've got no money.)

**Ones and twos** shoes

**Ooh la la** bra

**Orange peel** feel

**Overcoat maker** undertaker
(A 'wooden overcoat' is a slang term for 'coffin'.)

**Oxford scholar** collar, dollar
(In the mid-nineteenth century there were about four US dollars to the pound and so five shillings became known as a 'dollar', which was converted to an 'Oxford scholar'.)

### P

**Pain in the neck** cheque
(Which it could be if you had to write a large one.)

**Pair of kippers** slippers

**Pall Mall** gal (girl)

**Panoramas** pyjamas
(A rhyme used chiefly by parents to encourage children in the 1950s to go to bed, as in, 'Come on, time to get your panoramas on'.)

**Pantomime cow** row (argument)

**Paper bag** nag

**Paraffin lamp** tramp
(Usually abbreviated to 'paraffin' in recognition of the liquid refreshment associated with down-and-outs.)

**Partick Thistle** whistle
(After the poor relations of Glasgow football whose lack of success led fan Billy Connolly to remark: 'I grew up thinking they were called Partick Thistle Nil'.)

**Pattie Hearst** first (degree result)
(The American heiress hit the headlines in 1974 when, after being kidnapped by members of the Symbionese Liberation Army, she helped them rob a San Francisco bank.)

**Peace and quiet** diet

**Peanut butter** nutter

**Pearly Gate** plate

**Pea shooter** hooter (nose)

**Peas in the pot** hot

**Pebble-dashed** smashed (drunk)

**Peckham Rye** tie
(Dating from the nineteenth century and commemorating the thoroughfare in south-east London.)

**Pen and ink** stink

**Penny-a-mile** tile (hat)
(A rhyme popular at the turn of the twentieth century when George Spartels wrote the music-hall song 'Where Did You Get That Hat?', with the line: 'Where did you get that tile?')

**Penny Black** back
(The Penny Black was the name of the first British postage stamp, issued in 1840.)

**Penny locket** pocket

**Percy Sledge** wedge (money)
(US soul singer whose biggest hit was the 1966 classic 'When A Man Loves A Woman'.)

**Percy Thrower** blower (telephone)
(After the television gardening guru (1913–88), as in, 'Who was that on the Percy Thrower?')

**Pete Tong** wrong
(After the Radio 1 disc jockey. A 2004 comedy film about a DJ who goes deaf was titled _It's All Gone Pete Tong_.)

**Peter O'Toole** stool
(This refers mainly to a bar stool, a favourite perch for the notoriously thirsty Irish actor.)

**Peter Pan** can (safe), van
(Hence the confusing instruction from the leader of a gang of ram-raiders, 'Quick, get the Peter Pan into the Peter Pan!')

**Petrol pump** hump
(Meaning bad mood, as in, 'You didn't 'arf have the petrol pump last night'.)

**Peyton Place** face
(Based on the 1956 novel of the same title, _Peyton Place_ debuted on British television in 1965 and was the first soap to be imported from the US.)

**Phil the Fluter** shooter (gun)
('Shooter' has been slang for 'gun' since the nineteenth century and is rhymed with the central character in the traditional Irish ballad 'Phil The Fluter's Ball'.)

**Philharmonic** gin and tonic

**Photo finish** Guinness

**Piccadilly** silly
(After the central London street so named after a local tailor named Robert Baker who specialised in making 'piccadils' – fashionable collars with lace borders.)

**Pick and choose** booze

**Pick up sticks** six

**Pickled onion** bunion

**Pie and liquor** vicar

**Pieces of eight** weight
(Usually condensed to 'pieces'.)

**Pig in the middle** piddle

**Pig's ear** beer
(From the late nineteenth century and thus predating the other (non-rhyming) slang use for 'pig's ear' meaning a 'cock-up'.)

**Pig's trotter** squatter

**Pillar and post** ghost
(The saying 'from pillar to post' apparently refers to the pillars and posts that were part of the indoor courts used for the game of real tennis.)

**Pimple and blotch** Scotch (whisky)

**Pin pegs** legs
(Shortened to 'pins'. (See also **Rin Tin Tins**.))

**Pinky and Perky** turkey
(After the singing puppet pigs. An episode of their show titled 'You Too Can Be a Prime Minister' was banned by the BBC in 1966 for fear that it might influence the forthcoming general election.)

**Pirates of Penzance** pants
(From the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera that premiered in 1879.)

**Plates of meat** feet
(First appeared in print in 1887 when an edition of _Referee_ included the lines: 'As she walked along the street with her little plates of meat, And the summer sunshine falling, On her golden Barnet Fair'.)

**Pleasure and pain** rain

**Plinkety plonk** vin blanc (white wine)
(First coined by Australian troops serving in France during the First World War and subsequently reduced to 'plonk'.)

**Polly parrots** carrots

**Polo mint** skint
(After the sweet introduced by Rowntree in 1948.)

**Poor relation** station
(This rhyme originated in the early twentieth century when only the wealthy could afford cars, leaving everyone else to travel by train.)

**Pop goes the weasel** diesel
(From the seventeenth-century nursery rhyme.)

**Pork chop** cop
(No doubt inspired by the fact that 'pig' has been a derogatory term for a police officer since at least 1811.)

**Pork pies** lies
(First recorded in the 1980s but now so well established that it is frequently abbreviated to 'porkies'.)

**Porky Pig** big
(After the cartoon pig who made his debut for Warner Bros in 1935.)

**Pot and pan** old man (husband or father)

**Pot of glue** clue

**Potatoes in the mould** cold
(Derived from the horticultural practice of covering potatoes still in the ground with a heap of earth to protect them from frost, and now reduced to the more familiar 'taters'.)

**Pots and dishes** wishes

**Pound note** coat

**Pounds and pence** sense

**Pride and joy** boy

**Punch and Judy** moody
(The traditional children's entertainment dates back to sixteenth-century Italy and a character called Punchinello who was then anglicised in the UK as Mr Punch in 1662.)

### Q

**Quaker Oat** coat
(After the US porridge-making company formed in 1901 and with a nod to the warmth provided by both a bowl of the cereal and an overcoat.)

**Queens Park Ranger** stranger
(After the West London football club and first heard in the 1960s.)

**Quentin Crisp** lisp
(Quentin Crisp (1908–99) became an author, raconteur and gay icon after changing his name from the less exotic Denis Pratt.)

### R

**Rabbit and pork** talk
(Since its inception around 1941, this rhyme has entered mainstream dialect as 'rabbit'.)

**Radio Rental** mental
(Based on the name of TV rental firm Radio Rentals, this rhyme first appeared in the 1970s.)

**Rag and bone** throne (toilet)

**Raging thirst** first (degree result)

**Randolph Scott** spot
(From the US actor (1903–87), a celluloid Western hero of the 1940s.)

**Rant and rave** shave

**Rasher and bubble** double (in darts)
(From the cheap dish of bacon and bubble and squeak, which is leftover mashed potatoes and cabbage. (See also **Bubble and squeak**.))

**Raspberry tart** fart
(Blowing 'raspberries' to make a farting sound has been a playground pursuit since the nineteenth century.)

**Rattle and clank** bank

**Read and write** fight

**Reeling and rocking** stocking
(A rhyme from the rock 'n' roll era when fashions were becoming more daring; taken from the title of Chuck Berry's 1958 track 'Reelin' And Rockin'.)

**Rhubarb crumble** grumble

**Rhythm and blues** shoes

**Ribbon and curl** girl

**Richard Burtons** curtains
(After the noted Welsh actor (1925–84).)

**Richard Todd** cod
(After the British actor, as in, 'I'll have a Richard Todd and a portion of Jaggers, please'.)

**Riff raff** Taff (Welsh)

**Rifle range** change (money)

**Rinky dink** pink (snooker ball)

**Rin Tin Tins** pins (legs)
(German Shepherd dog Rin Tin Tin – affectionately known as 'Rinty' – was a movie star from the 1920s and a TV star in the 1950s. (See also **Pin pegs**.))

**Rip and tear** swear

**Rip Van Winkle** tinkle (pee)
(Created in an 1819 short story by US author Washington Irving.)

**Rising damp** cramp
(This phrase enjoyed a new lease of life with Eric Chappell's 1970s comedy series starring Leonard Rossiter as seedy landlord Rigsby.)

**River Nile** denial
(As in, 'He just won't admit it – I'm afraid he's in the River Nile'.)

**River Ouse** booze

**River Tyne** wine

**Roast beef** teeth

**Roast pork** fork

**Rob Roy** boy
(In recognition of Scottish outlaw Rob Roy McGregor (1671– 1734), sometimes known as the Scottish Robin Hood and hero of Walter Scott's 1818 novel _Rob Roy_.)

**Roberta Flack** sack
(The name of the American singer not only signifies job dismissal but also the colloquial meaning of 'sack' as 'bed'.)

**Robin Hood** good
(Mainly used in a negative manner, as in, 'What did you buy that for? That's no Robin Hood!')

**Robinson and Cleaver** fever
(After a draper's store that opened in London's Regent Street at the end of the nineteenth century.)

**Rock 'n' roll** dole

**Rock of ages** wages
(Based on the title of the popular hymn written by Revd Augustus Montague Toplady and first published in 1775.)

**Rocking horse** sauce

**Rocks and boulders** shoulders

**Rogan Josh** dosh (money)
(A 1990s rhyme cooked up by lovers of the aromatic curry dish.)

**Roger Mellie** telly
(Roger Mellie, the man on the telly, is a strip cartoon character in the satirical magazine _Viz_ , which began publication in 1979.)

**Roger Moore** door
(After the English actor (1927–2017) best known for playing James Bond from 1973 to 1985.)

**Rogue and villain** shilling
(First recorded in 1859, the term continued doing the rounds right up until the shilling – the equivalent of 5p – was withdrawn in 1971.)

**Roller coaster** toaster

**Rolls-Royce** choice
(An apt rhyme because if they could afford it, a lot of people would plump for a Rolls-Royce as their car of choice.)

**Roman candles** sandals
(Taken from the fireworks that have lit up 5 November for decades, and particularly fitting as sandals were the favoured footwear of the Romans.)

**Romantic ballad** salad

**Ronnie Biggs** digs (lodgings)
(A member of the gang who pulled off the Great Train Robbery of 1963 and then escaped after serving just fifteen months in jail.)

**Rookery Nook** book
(From the title of the 1923 novel written by Ben Travers (1886– 1980) and subsequently adapted into a popular stage farce.)

**Rory O'Moore** door, floor
(A fictitious, all-purpose Irish character from the nineteenth century.)

**Rosie Lee** tea
(The identity of the original Rosie Lee remains a mystery but the rhyme bearing her name is believed to have originated around the time of the First World War.)

**Rosie O'Grady's** ladies' (toilet)

**Round the houses** trousers

**Roy Hudds** spuds (potatoes)
(After the veteran actor, comedian and expert on all things related to the music hall.)

**Royal Mail** bail

**Rub-a-dub** pub, sub (pay advance)
('Rub-a-dub' has been used as a rhyme for 'pub' since the early twentieth century and is generally abbreviated to 'rubber'.)

**Ruby Murray** curry
(Even though her heyday was the 1950s, Irish singer Ruby Murray (1935–96) was still fresh in the public's minds when the great curry boom hit Britain in the early seventies.)

**Ruby red** head

**Rudolf Hess** mess
(After Hitler's deputy (1894–1987) who flew solo to Scotland in an attempt to negotiate peace with Britain and subsequenty became a prisoner of war.)

**Ruin and spoil** oil

**Runner and rider** cider

**Rupert Bears** flares (trousers), shares
(Created by English artist Mary Tourtel, Nutwood's most famous resident made his debut in a strip cartoon in the _Daily Express_ in 1920.)

**Rusty nail** jail

### S

**Sad and sorry** lorry

**Safe and sound** ground

**Saint and sinner** dinner
(A religious nineteenth-century term giving thanks to the Lord for food while at the same time hinting at the perils of gluttony.)

**Salmon and trout** gout, snout (tobacco), stout (beer)
('Snout' has been slang for 'tobacco' since the late nineteenth century and soon gave rise to the rhyme 'salmon and trout', or 'salmon' for short.)

**Salvation Army** barmy
(After the Christian charity founded by William Booth in London's East End in 1865.)

**Samuel Pepys** creeps
(From the celebrated London diarist (1633–1703), as in, 'This place gives me the Samuels.')

**Sandy Powell** towel
(A more palatable alternative to Enoch (see **Enoch Powell** ) is this rhyme commemorating the red-haired, Yorkshire-born music-hall comedian (1898–1982).)

**Santa's grotto** blotto (drunk)
('Blotto' has been a slang term for 'very drunk' since the First World War.)

**Satin and silk** milk

**Saucepan handle** candle

**Saucepan lid** kid
(Although this can be used in the sense of 'to kid' meaning 'to fool', its most common form since the 1960s has been with reference to children.)

**Sausage and mash** cash, crash
(The rhyme is often shortened to 'sausage' and may have some connection with the phrase 'not a sausage' meaning 'absolutely nothing'.)

**Sausage roll** dole

**Scooby-Doo** clue
(After the clueless Great Dane who features in the Hanna-Barbera cartoons.)

**Scotch eggs** legs

**Scotch pegs** legs
(Dating from the mid-nineteenth century and usually abbreviated to 'scotches'.)

**Scuba diver** fiver

**Sebastian Coes** toes
(A relevant rhyme because few people could 'have it on their Sebs' (make a quick getaway) faster than the man who won 1,500 metres gold at both the 1980 and 1984 Olympics.)

**Seek and search** church

**Semolina** cleaner
(From the grim dessert that was a mainstay of school dinners in the 1950s.)

**Sexton Blake** fake
(Fictional English detective who made his debut in _The Halfpenny Marvel_ magazine in 1893. Art forger Tom Keating called his forgeries his 'Sexton Blakes'.)

**Shake and shiver** river

**Shepherd's pie** sky
(Probably connected to the rhyme: 'Red sky at night shepherd's delight, Red sky in the morning shepherd's warning'.)

**Sherbet Dab** cab

**Sherbet Dip** kip

**Shillings and pence** sense

**Shiny and bright** all right

**Shout and holler** collar

**Shovel and pick** nick (prison)
(A reference to the tools once used by prisoners.)

**Sighs and tears** ears)

**Silver and gold** old

**Silver spoon** moon

**Simply shocking** stocking

**Sinbad the Sailor** tailor
(From the seafaring hero in _The Arabian Nights_ stories.)

**Sistine Chapel** apple
(After the chapel in the papal palace in Rome's Vatican City, famous for its ornate ceiling by Michelangelo.)

**Six and eight** straight

**Skin and blister** sister
(A rhyme originating in the 1920s, as in, 'Is your skin and blister still going out with that geezer with the wonky minces?')

**Sky rocket** pocket
(First recorded in the nineteenth century and still heard today. The term is often shortened to 'sky'.)

**Skylark** park (a vehicle)

**Skyscraper** paper

**Slap and tickle** pickle
(A euphemism for foreplay, the 1979 song 'Slap And Tickle' by Squeeze contains the lines: 'Never chew a pickle, With a little slap and tickle'.)

**Slug and snail** fingernail

**Smack in the eye** pie
(Which could lead to some confusion if someone asks you, 'Do you want a smack in the eye?')

**Smash and grab** cab
(A thinly veiled accusation that taxi fares are daylight robbery.)

**Smear and smudge** judge

**Smile and smirk** work
(Often shortened to 'smile', as in, 'All smile and no Evelyn makes Jack a dull boy'.)

**Snow and ice** price

**Snow Whites** tights

**Soap and lather** father
(A late nineteenth-century rhyme mirroring Dad's morning shave.)

**Soap and water** daughter

**Sodom and Gomorrah** borrow ('borrer')
(According to the Book of Genesis, Sodom and Gomorrah were the two cities destroyed by God for their sinful reputations.)

**Soldier bold** cold
(An old military rhyme reminiscent of Private Pike in _Dad's Army_ wrapped up in his woolly scarf on parade because his mum didn't want him to catch cold.)

**Son and daughtered** slaughtered (drunk)

**Sooty and Sweep** on the cheap
(Created by the late, great Harry Corbett (1918–89), Sooty and Sweep bestrode children's television for more than 50 years.)

**Sorry and sad** bad

**Southend beach** speech

**Southend Piers** ears

**Spanish guitar** cigar

**Spanish waiter** potato

**Spare rib** fib

**Sparrow** bow and arrow
(From the nursery rhyme 'Who Killed Cock Robin?' (see **Bow and arrow** ).)

**Spotted dick** sick

**Squad halt** salt
(A military rhyme popular during the First World War.)

**Squadron Leader Biggles** giggles
(The daredevil British pilot and boys' own hero was created by author W. E. Johns in 1932 and went on to feature in nearly 100 books.)

**St Louis blues** shoes

**Stage fright** light (ale)

**Stamford Bridge** fridge
(In honour of the home ground of Chelsea Football Club.)

**Stammer and stutter** butter

**Stan and Ollie** brolly (umbrella)
(After comedy movie duo Stan Laurel (1890–1965) and Oliver Hardy (1892–1957).)

**Stand at ease** cheese

**Stand to attention** pension

**Stars and Garters** tomatoes
(After the title of the 1960s ITV variety show set in a London pub and hosted by Ray Martine and his pet mynah bird.)

**Steam tug** mug (fool)
(Invariably shortened to 'steamer', as in, 'Fancy falling for that old trick! What a steamer!')

**Steely Dan** tan
(After the New York jazz/rock founded by Donald Fagen and Walter Becker.)

**Steve McQueens** jeans
(In memory of the US movie star (1930–80), nicknamed the 'King of Cool'.)

**Stevie Nicks** flicks (cinema)
(After the American singer best known for her work with Fleetwood Mac in the 1970s.)

**Stevie Wonder** chunder (vomit), thunder
(The blind American singer/songwriter (born Steveland Judkins) had his first hit at thirteen.)

**Stewed prune** tune

**Sticks and stones** bones
(From the familiar playground rhyme: 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me'.)

**Sticky toffee** coffee

**Stinging nettle** kettle

**Stone jug** mug (fool)

**Stop and start** heart

**Strawberry split** git

**Strawberry tart** heart
(A puzzling rhyme until it is shortened to 'strawberry' and the visual connection becomes clear.)

**String vest** pest
(The string vest was invented in 1933 by Norwegian army commandant Henrik Brun who sewed together the first garment from old fishing nets.)

**Struggle and strain** train
(A rhyme that perfectly sums up rail travel in modern Britain.)

**Stutter and stammer** hammer

**Sugar and spice** nice
(From the old rhyme claiming that little girls are made of 'sugar and spice and all things nice'.)

**Sunday roast** post

**Surrey Docks** pox
(From the Thames-side area of Rotherhithe that served as a dockyard from 1696 to 1969.)

**Swallow and sigh** collar and tie
(Possibly based on what you might do if your tie is too tight.)

**Swanee River** liver
(The Suwanee River flows from Georgia to the Gulf of Mexico and in 1851 inspired Stephen C. Foster to write 'The Swanee River' (he misspelled the name).)

**Swear and cuss** bus

**Sweaty sock** Jock (Scotsman)

**Sweeney Todd** Flying Squad
(Sweeney Todd, the fictitious demon barber of Fleet Street, first appeared in print in 1846. In the early 1920s the _Daily Mail_ gave the name Flying Squad to the fast response unit of the Metropolitan Police, and in 1975 ITV chose the slang term _The Sweeney_ as the name for their hard-hitting cops and robbers series starring John Thaw.)

**Swiss army knife** wife

**Syrup of fig** wig
(A 1980s rhyme based on the dreaded laxative syrup of figs. The phrase is usually condensed to 'syrup'.)

### T

**Tapioca** joker (cards)
(Tapioca is a starchy grain that was used to make a poor man's rice pudding in post-war Britain.)

**Tate and Lyle** style
(From the sugar company formed in 1921.)

**Taxi rank** bank

**Tea and toast** post
(A throwback to the time when the morning post in the UK used to arrive while you were having breakfast.)

**Tea caddy** Paddy (Irishman)

**Tea leaf** thief
(First heard around the start of the twentieth century and still in all-too-frequent use.)

**Tennis racket** jacket

**Tent peg** egg

**These and those** toes

**Thick and thin** chin, grin

**This and that** cat

**Thomas Edison** medicine
(The prolific Thomas Edison (1847–1931) held over 1,093 US patents, his most famous invention being the electric light bulb.)

**Thomas Tilling** shilling
(Thomas Tilling (1825–93) founded a transport company in 1846 and by the time of his death had a stable of 4,000 horses pulling buses across London.)

**Tiddler's bait** late
(Perhaps originating from the notion that a small boy fishing for tiddlers might be late home for his dinner.)

**Tiddlywink** drink
(Now shortened to 'tiddly', which has since become a familiar euphemism for 'slightly drunk'.)

**Tilbury Docks** socks
(After the port on the north bank of the Thames.)

**Tin bath** scarf
(Often shortened to 'tin', so that when venturing out into the cold you're advised to wear your 'tin and titfer' (see **Tit for tat** ).)

**Tin tack** sack
(Dating back to the late nineteenth century, this has become the accepted rhyme for dismissal at work.)

**Tin tank** bank

**Ting-a-ling** ring

**Tit for tat** hat
(The phrase 'tit for tat' meaning 'retaliation' is said to originate from the sixteenth century 'tip for tap' referring to an exchange of blows.)

**Toby jug** mug (fool)
(First made by Staffordshire potters in the 1760s, a Toby jug usually depicts a man in a long coat and tricorn hat holding a mug of beer.)

**Tod Sloan** alone
(Tod Sloan (1874–1933) was an American jockey who suffered a fall from grace amid allegations that he had been betting on his own races. He died alone, giving rise to the expression 'on your tod'.)

**Toilet roll** dole

**Tokyo Rose** nose
(After the nickname given to Iva Toguri D'Aquino who tried to demoralise Allied troops by broadcasting Japanese propaganda during the Second World War.)

**Tom and Dick** sick
(The term 'Tom, Dick and Harry' meaning 'people in general' dates back to at least the nineteenth century.)

**Tom and Jerry** merry
(From the cartoon cat and mouse created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera for MGM in 1940.)

**Tom Sawyer** lawyer
(From the boy hero of four novels by US writer Mark Twain, beginning with _The Adventures of Tom Sawyer_ (1876).)

**Tom Thumb** rum
(After the hero in English folklore who was no bigger than his father's thumb.)

**Tomato purée** jury

**Tomato sauce** horse

**Tomcat** doormat

**Tomfoolery** jewellery
(In use since the 1930s, chiefly as underworld slang for stolen jewellery. It was soon shortened to 'tom'.)

**Tommy Dodd** God
(Nobody knows whether the Tommy Dodd in this nineteenth-century rhyme ever existed, which is probably why it appealed to atheists.)

**Tommy guns** the runs (diarrhoea)
(Inspired by the machine-gun fire with which a dose of diarrhoea splatters the toilet bowl.)

**Tommy Steele** jellied eel
(After Tommy Steele, the one-time merchant seaman who was launched as Britain's answer to Elvis in 1956.)

**Tommy Trinder** window
(With his pork-pie hat and catchphrase 'You lucky people', fast-talking, London-born comedian Tommy Trinder (1909–89) was one of Britain's most popular entertainers.)

**Tommy Tucker** sucker
(From the nursery rhyme – first published in 1829 – about orphan Little Tommy Tucker who sang for his supper.)

**Tooting Bec** peck (kiss)
(Based on the district of south London, as in, 'Go on, don't be shy – give her a Tooting on the cheek'.)

**Top hat** prat
(Surely a comment by the working classes on the vacuous toffs who turn up at places like Royal Ascot in their top hats.)

**Town crier** liar

**Trafalgar Square** chair

**Treacle tart** sweetheart
(More commonly shortened to 'treacle'.)

**Treble chance** dance
(A rhyme taken from the name of a multiple bet on the football pools.)

**Trolley and tram** ham
(A rhyme celebrating two old forms of London public transport – the tram and the trolleybus.)

**Trombone** phone
(This has continued to serve as a popular alternative to 'dog and bone' because of the link between the musical instrument and 'blower'.)

**Trouble and strife** wife
(Although the term implies marital discord it is generally used affectionately.)

**Troubles and cares** stairs

**Tumble down the sink** drink
(A nineteenth-century rhyme later shortened to 'tumble-down' or even 'tumble'.)

**Turkish bath** laugh

**Turned and tossed** lost

**Turtle dove** love

**Turtle doves** gloves
(First recorded in the 1850s and often abbreviated to 'turtles'.)

**Twist and twirl** girl

**Two and eight** state (mess)
(Originating in the 1930s, this rhyme usually refers to a nervous state but it can also apply to general untidiness.)

**Two thirty** dirty

### U

**Ugly sister** blister
(From the Ugly Sisters who gave Cinderella such a hard time.)

**Umbrella** fella (boyfriend)

**Uncle Ben** ten
(Possibly derived from Uncle Ben's rice, first marketed in 1943.)

**Uncle Bert** shirt
(Usually shortened to 'uncle'.)

**Uncle Billy** chilly

**Uncle Fred** bread

**Uncle Gus** bus

**Uncle Mac** quack (doctor)
(Derek McCulloch – 'Uncle Mac' – (1897–1967) presented _Children's Hour_ in the 1930s. The rhyme may originate from the fact that just as a 'quack' isn't a real doctor, so Uncle Mac wasn't your real uncle.)

**Uncle Ned** bed
(First recorded in the 1920s, this rhyme, too, can be shortened to 'uncle'.)

**Uncle Reg** veg
(Hence that Cockney favourite, 'Hands and feet and two Uncle Reg'.)

**Uncle Sam** lamb

**Uncle Ted** bed

**Uncle Wilf** the filth (police)

**Uncle Willy** silly

**Uncles and aunts** plants

**Union Jack** back
(Mentioning the flag of the United Kingdom often indicates a painful back, as in, 'I'm having real trouble with me Union just lately'.)

**Up and down** brown (ale)

**Up and under** thunder
(A Rugby League term much loved by colourful BBC commentator Eddie Waring (1910–86).)

### V

**Vanity Fair** chair
(From the 1848 novel of that title by William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–63).)

**Vera Lynn** gin
(The 'Forces' Sweetheart' of the Second World War has become so associated with gin that it is frequently shortened to 'Vera'.)

**Vincent Price** ice
(After the US actor (1911–93), famous for his chilling roles in horror movies.)

**Vincent van Gogh** cough
(The Dutch painter (1853–90) was beset by depression, hallucinations and paranoia. In his later years he committed himself to a mental asylum and sliced off part of his left ear.)

**Von Trapp** crap
(The Austrian von Trapp family were a group of singers whose escape from the Nazis inspired _The Sound of Music_.)

### W

**Walnut Whip** kip
(For the uninitiated a Walnut Whip is a chocolate cone with a whipped vanilla fondant filling and a walnut on top.)

**Walter Mitty** kitty
(Based on the fictional character in James Thurber's story _The Secret Life of Walter Mitty_ , first published in 1939. As in, 'How much bread is left in the Walter?')

**Wanstead Flats** spats
(A late nineteenth-century rhyme from the days when spats – short fabric covers that were worn on the lower leg to protect the wearer's shoes from mud – were the height of fashion.)

**Watch and chain** brain
(This rhyme related to intelligence – or lack of it – leading to remarks such as, 'You'll have to excuse him, his watch is a bit slow'.)

**Water bottle** throttle

**Watford Gap** slap
(After the geographical break in the hills in Northampton-shire. Used as in, 'If he carries on like that he's going to get a Watford Gap'.)

**Weasel and stoat** coat
(This familiar rhyme may stem from the fact that both animals are renowned for their fine coats.)

**Weaver's chair** prayer

**Wee Georgie Wood** good
(Commemorating the 4ft 9in British music-hall comedian (1894–1979) who spent much of his career playing children.)

**Weeping willow** pillow

**West Ham Reserves** nerves
(After the East End football club and usually shortened to 'West Hams'.)

**Westminster Abbey** cabbie, shabby

**Whip and top** strop
(From the child's toy of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The rhyme is often shortened to 'whip', as in, 'Your love and kisses is in a bit of a whip today'.)

**Whisky and soda** Skoda

**Whistle and flute** suit
(Usually shortened to 'whistle', as in, 'I've only gone and spilt rocking horse down me new whistle!')

**Whistle and toot** loot

**White Cliffs of Dover** over
('Over' and 'Dover' have been a rhyming couple since Vera Lynn's 1940s stirring rendition of 'There'll Be Bluebirds Over The White Cliffs of Dover'.)

**White mice** ice
(As in the unlikely request, 'Do you want white mice in your Scotch?')

**Whitechapel** apple
(From the district's long-standing association with Spitalfields fruit and vegetable market until it moved to a new location in 1991.)

**Wicked rumours** bloomers (knickers)

**Widow Twankey** hanky (handkerchief)
(After the name of the comic washerwoman – normally played by a man – in the pantomime _Aladdin_.)

**Wilbur Wright** flight
(The American Wright brothers Wilbur (1867–1912) and Orville (1871–1948) were the pioneers of aviation who, in 1903, made the first powered flight in an aeroplane.)

**Wild West** vest

**Wilfrid Brambell** gamble
(Irish actor (1912–85) who played rag and bone man Albert Steptoe in the classic TV sitcom _Steptoe and Son_.)

**Will o' the wisps** crisps

**William Joyce** voice
(Alias 'Lord Haw Haw', William Joyce (1906–46) possessed the most hated voice in the Second World War as he broadcast Nazi propaganda over British airwaves.)

**William Tell** smell
(Based on the fourteenth-century Swiss folk hero.)

**Wilson Pickett** ticket
(A rhyme taken from the name of the US soul singer (1941–2006).)

**Wind and kite** web site

**Winnie the Pooh** shoe
(Created by English author A. A. Milne (1882–1956), the lovable bear with a taste for honey first appeared in book form in 1926.)

**Wooden pews** news

**Wooden plank** Yank (American)

**Woolwich and Greenwich** spinach
(From two districts of south-east London where the second is pronounced 'Grinidge'.)

**Working classes** glasses

**Worms and snails** fingernails

**Worzel Gummidge** rummage
(The talking scarecrow made his debut in print in 1936.)

**Wyatt Earp** burp
(After the Wild West marshal (1848–1929) who kept law and order in Dodge City and participated in the infamous Gunfight at the OK Corral in 1881.)

### XYZ

**Yankee Doodles** noodles
(See **Macaroni** )

**Yarmouth bloater** motor
(From the Norfolk fishing port of Great Yarmouth, renowned for its smoked fish, a UK bloater being a smoked herring.)

**Yellow silk** milk

**Yorkshire Tyke** mike (microphone)
('Tyke' is slang for a Yorkshireman.)

**You and me** tea

**You must** crust
(A simple rhyme from post-war Britain urging children to eat the crusts off their bread.)

**Yours and ours** flowers

## English to Cockney

### A

**Advice** lump of ice

**Ale** Daily Mail

**All nighter** jet fighter

**All right** shiny and bright

**Alone (On your own)** Darby and Joan, Tod Sloan, Jack Jones

**Appendix** Jimi Hendrix

**Apple** Sistine Chapel, Whitechapel

**Arm** Chalk Farm, false alarm, lucky charm

**Army** daft and barmy

**Aunt** garden plant

### B

**Back** Penny Black, Union Jack

**Bad** Jack the Lad, sorry and sad

**Bail** Royal Mail

**Baked beans** kings and queens

**Baker** Long Acre

**Balti** Basil Fawlty

**Banana** Gertie Gitana

**Bank** Armitage Shank, cab rank, fish and tank, iron tank, rattle and clank, taxi rank, tin tank

**Bar** Jack tar, Jean Michel Jarre

**Barber** Dover harbour

**Barmy** Dad's Army, Monty's army, Salvation Army

**Barrow** cock sparrow

**Basin** Charlie Mason, Fortnum & Mason

**Bath** hat and scarf

**Battery** charm and flattery

**Batty** Carlo Gatti

**Beak** (see **Magistrate** )

**Beard** strange and weird

**Bed** Uncle Ned, Uncle Ted

**Beef** itchy teeth

**Beer (Bitter, Bottle of Bass, Brown (ale), Guinness, Lager, Light (ale), Mild, Stout)** Christmas cheer, pig's ear, apple fritter, kitty litter, laugh and titter, up and down, photo finish, Forsyte Saga, day and night, stage fright, salmon and trout

**Beginner** Lilley and Skinner

**Believe** Adam and Eve

**Bell** Little Nell

**Belly** Auntie Nelly, Darby Kelly, George Melly, New Delhi

**Berk** Charlie Smirke

**Best** Mae West

**Bet** deep in debt

**Big** Porky Pig

**Bigot** Lester Piggott

**Bike** Dick Van Dyke

**Bill** Muswell Hill

**Bingo** George and Ringo

**Bitter** (see **Beer** )

**Black** coalman's sack

**Blade (knife)** First aid

**Blind** Golden Hind

**Blister** Ugly sister

**Bloke** heap of coke

**Bloomers** (see **Knickers** )

**Blotto** (see **Drunk** )

**Blower** (see **Phone** )

**Boat** frog in the throat, hat and coat

**Bob** (see **Shilling** )

**Body** Big Ears and Noddy

**Bog (toilet) (Khazi, Throne)** Captain's log, Kermit the frog, Frank Zappa, Ilie Nastase, rag and bone

**Bogey** Jimmy Logie, old fogey

**Boil (spot)** Bodie and Doyle, Conan Doyle

**Bones** sticks and stones

**Bonkers** marbles and conkers

**Book** Captain Hook, fish hook, Rookery Nook

**Bookie** cream cookie

**Boots** daisy roots, King Canutes

**Booze** pick and choose, River Ouse

**Boozer** (see **Pub** )

**Borrow** Sodom and Gomorrah

**Boss** dead loss

**Bottle** Aristotle, Gerry Cottle

**Bottle of Bass** (see **Beer** )

**Bounce (a cheque)** half-ounce

**Bouncer (doorman)** half-ouncer

**Bow and arrow** sparrow

**Bowler (hat)** bottle of cola

**Box (theatre)** Charles James Fox

**Boy** pride and joy, Rob Roy

**Boy Scout** brussel sprout

**Bra** ooh la la

**Braces** airs and graces, Ascot Races

**Brain** down the drain, watch and chain

**Brakes** Charlie Drakes

**Brandy** fine and dandy, Mahatma Gandhi

**Brat** Jack Sprat

**Bread** needle and thread, Uncle Fred

**Breath** life and death

**Brick** Dublin trick

**Bride** fat and wide, mother's pride

**Broke (penniless)** coals and coke

**Brolly** (see **Umbrella** )

**Broom** bride and groom

**Brother** manhole cover

**Brown (ale)** (see **Beer** )

**Brown (halfpenny)** Camden Town

**Brown (snooker ball)** half a crown

**Bunion** pickled onion

**Burp** Wyatt Earp

**Bus** don't make a fuss, swear and cuss, Uncle Gus

**Butter** mutter and stutter, stammer and stutter

**Button** Len Hutton

### C

**Cab (Taxi)** flounder and dab, Sherbet Dab, smash and grab, Joe Baksi

**Cabbie** Westminster Abbey

**Cadge** coat and badge

**Café** Colonel Gaddafi

**Cake** give and take

**Can (safe)** Peter Pan

**Cancel** Nigel Mansell

**Candle** saucepan handle

**Cans (headphones)** Desperate Dans

**Cap** game of nap

**Car (Motor)** jamjar, haddock and bloater, Yarmouth bloater

**Cards (playing)** Coldstream Guards

**Carrots** Polly parrots

**Cash (Readies)** Arthur Ashe, bangers and mash, pie and mash, sausage and mash, Nelson Eddys

**Cat** cooking fat, this and that

**Ceiling** funny feeling

**Cell (prison)** flowery dell

**Chair** here and there, lion's lair, Lionel Blair, Trafalgar Square, Vanity Fair

**Chalk** Duke of York, Lambeth Walk

**Chancer** ballet dancer

**Change (money)** rifle range

**Charmer** Jeffrey Dahmer

**Chat** chew the fat

**Cheek (nerve)** hide and seek

**Cheeky** cockaleekie

**Cheese** balmy breeze, John Cleese, stand at ease

**Cheque** chicken's neck, goose's neck, Jeff Beck, nervous wreck, pain in the neck

**Chest** bird's nest, east and west, Mae West

**Chief** corned beef

**Chill** Jimmy Hill

**Chilly** Uncle Billy

**Chin** Andy McGinn, Errol Flynn, Gilbey's gin, thick and thin

**Chip** lucky dip

**Chips** jockeys' whips

**Choice** Rolls-Royce

**Choker** Bram Stoker

**Chum** Fruit Gum

**Chunder** (see **Vomit** )

**Church** left in the lurch, seek and search

**Cider** runner and rider, Shaun Ryder

**Cigar** La-di-da, Spanish guitar

**Cigarette lighter** kung fu fighter

**Clanger** coat hanger

**Claret (blood)** boiled beef and carrot

**Cleaner** semolina

**Clink** (see **Jail** )

**Clock** dickory dock

**Closed** doublet and hosed

**Clothes line** grape vine

**Clown** Charlie Brown

**Clue** didgeridoo, pot of glue, Scooby-Doo

**Coal** merry old soul

**Coat** all afloat, bucket afloat, Dover boat, nanny goat, pound note, Quaker Oat, weasel and stoat

**Cockney rhyming slang** Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

**Cod** Richard Todd

**Coffee** Everton toffee, sticky toffee

**Cold** Cheltenham Gold, potatoes in the mould, soldier bold

**Collar** Oxford scholar, shout and holler

**Collar and tie** swallow and sigh

**Comb** garden gnomee

**Concertina** constant screamer

**Conk** (see **Nose** )

**Cook** babbling brook

**Cop (police officer) (Copper, Filth)** lemon drop, pork chop, bottle and stopper, clodhopper, grasshopper, Uncle Wilf

**Copper** (see **Cop** )

**Cords (corduroy trousers)** House of Lords

**Corner** Johnny Horner

**Cough** horse and trough, on and off, Vincent van Gogh

**Cousin** baker's dozen

**Cow** Chairman Mao

**Coward** Frankie Howerd

**Cramp** rising damp

**Crash** sausage and mash

**Creeps** Samuel Pepys

**Crime** lemon and lime

**Cripple** raspberry ripple

**Crisps** will o' the wisps

**Crook** babbling brook

**Crust** you must

**Cup** dog and pup

**Cupboard** Mother Hubbard

**Curry** Ruby Murray

**Curtains** Richard Burtons

### D

**Daft** fore and aft

**Dance** kick and prance, treble chance

**Darts** horses and carts

**Daughter** bottle of water, bricks and mortar, soap and water

**Dead** brown bread, gone to bed

**Deal** jellied eel

**Denial** River Nile

**Dense** garden fence

**Dice** cats and mice

**Diesel** pop goes the weasel

**Diet** Brixton riot, peace and quiet

**Digs (lodgings)** Ronnie Biggs

**Dinner** Michael Winner, saint and sinner

**Dirty** hundred to thirty, two thirty

**Doddle** Glenn Hoddle

**Dog** London fog

**Dogs (greyhound racing)** cherry hogs

**Dole (Giro)** jam roll, Nat King Cole, Old King Cole, rock 'n' roll, sausage roll, toilet roll, Night Boat to Cairo

**Dollar** Oxford scholar

**Door** George Bernard Shaw, Roger Moore, Rory O'Moore

**Doormat** tomcat

**Dosh** (see **Money** )

**Double (in darts)** rasher and bubble

**Dough** (see **Money** )

**Dozen** country cousin

**Draught** George Raft

**Drawers** (see **Knickers** )

**Dreams** custard creams

**Dress** mustard and cress

**Drill** Benny Hill

**Drink** Engelbert Humperdinck, kitchen sink, tiddlywink, tumble down the sink

**Drunk (Blotto, Plastered, Slaughtered, Smashed, Tiddly)** elephant's trunk, Mickey Monk, Santa's Grotto, booed and hissed, Brahms and Liszt, fog and mist, Gorillas in the Mist, hand and fist, Oliver Twist, Scotch mist, lord and mastered, son and daughtered, pebble-dashed, Bo Diddley

### E

**Ear** bottle of beer, glass of beer

**Earner, nice little** Bunsen burner

**Ears** King Lears, lords and peers, sighs and tears, Southend Piers

**Easy** ham and cheesy, lemon squeezy

**Egg** borrow and beg, tent peg

**Eight** garden gate

**Epsom races** airs and graces

**Evens (betting odds)** Major Stevens

**Eyes** mince pies

### F

**Face** Boat Race, Chevy Chase, fillet of plaice, kipper and plaice, Peyton Place

**Facts** brass tacks

**Fag (cigarette) (Smoke, Woods (Woodbines))** Harry Wragg, jet lag, oily rag, puff and drag, laugh and joke, do me goods

**Fags (cigarettes)** Oxford bags

**Fake** Sexton Blake

**Fare** grey mare

**Fart** raspberry tart

**Fat** Jack Sprat

**Father** soap and lather

**Favour** cheesy Quaver

**Feel** orange peel

**Feet** dog's meat, plates of meat

**Fella (boyfriend)** umbrella

**Fever** Robinson and Cleaver

**Fib** spare rib

**Fiddle** hey diddle diddle

**Fight** left and right, read and write

**Filth** (see **Cop** )

**Fine (penalty)** bottle of wine

**Fingernail** slug and snail

**Fingernails** worms and snails

**Fingers** bell ringers

**Fire** Anna Maria, Black Maria

**First (degree result)** Geoff Hurst, Pattie Hearst, raging thirst

**Fish** Lillian Gish

**Five** man alive

**Fiver** deep sea diver, Lady Godiva, scuba diver

**Flares (trousers)** Dan Dares, Lionel Blairs, Rupert Bears

**Flicks (cinema)** Stevie Nicks

**Flies** Morecambe and Wise

**Flight** Wilbur Wright

**Floor** Mrs Moore, Rory O'Moore

**Flowers** April showers, early hours, yours and ours

**Flu** inky blue

**Flutter (bet)** grumble and mutter

**Flying Squad** Sweeney Todd

**Fob (watch)** kettle and hob

**Food** in the mood

**Fool** garden tool

**Foot** chimney and soot

**Football pools** April Fools

**Foreman** Joe O'Gorman

**Fork** Duke of York, roast pork

**Four** knock at the door

**French, the bloody** muddy trench

**Fridge** London Bridge, Stamford Bridge

**Friend** Mile End

**Front (nerve)** James Hunt

**Funnel** Blackwall Tunnel

### G

**Gal** (see **Girl** )

**Gamble** Wilfrid Brambell

**Garage** horse and carriage

**Garden** Dolly Varden

**Geezer** fridge freezer, Julius Caesar, lemon squeezer

**Ghost** pillar and post

**Giggles** Squadron Leader Biggles

**Gin** Brian O'Linn, needle and pin, Nell Gwynn, Vera Lynn

**Gin and tonic** philharmonic

**Girl (Gal)** ivory pearl, mother of pearl, ribbon and curl, twist and twirl, Pall Mall

**Giro** (see **Dole** )

**Git** strawberry split

**Glasses (Specs)** working classes

**Gloves** turtle doves

**God** Tommy Dodd

**Goggle box** (see **Telly** )

**Good** Robin Hood, Wee Georgie Wood

**Gout** in and out, salmon and trout

**Grand (£1,000)** bag of sand

**Grass** old iron and brass

**Grass (police informant) (Nark)** car park, grass in the park, Noah's Ark

**Gravy** Army and Navy

**Greens (vegetables)** has beens, Nellie Deans

**Grey** night and day

**Grief** Omar Sharif

**Grin** thick and thin

**Ground** safe and sound

**Grumble** rhubarb crumble

**Guinness** (see **Beer** )

**Gut (stomach)** Limehouse Cut

**Guts** fruit and nuts

**Gutter** bread and butter

### H

**Haddock** Bessie Braddock, Fanny Cradock

**Hair** Barnet Fair, Biffo the Bear, Fred Astaire, Alf Garnett (barnet)

**Half (pint of beer)** cow and calf

**Ham** trolley and tram

**Hammer** stutter and stammer

**Hand** brass band, German band

**Hands** Margate sands

**Handy** Jack and Dandy

**Hanky (handkerchief)** Widow Twankey

**Hard** bread and lard, Marquis de Sade

**Hat (Tile)** ball and bat, tit for tat, penny-a-mile

**Head** ball of lead, crust of bread, Judge Dredd, loaf of bread, lump of lead, ruby red

**Head (of family)** daily bread

**Heart** jam tart, stop and start, strawberry tart

**Hell** ding dong bell

**Hill** Jack and Jill

**Hole** drum roll

**Home** gates of Rome

**Honda** Henry Fonda

**Honours** Jimmy Connors

**Hooter** (see **Nose** )

**Horse** bottle of sauce, tomato sauce

**Hot** Alan Knott, peas in the pot

**House** cat and mouse, Mickey Mouse

**Huff** cream puff

**Hump (anger)** petrol pump

### I

**Ice** Vincent Price, white mice

**Itch** Little Tich

### J

**Jacket** fag packet, tennis racket

**Jail (Clink, Nick, Slammer)** bucket and pail, ginger ale, moan and wail, rusty nail, kitchen sink, shovel and pick

**Jam** baby's pram

**Jeans** baked beans, Bethnal Greens, Dixie Deans, Steve McQueens

**Jellied eel** Tommy Steele

**Jewellery** tomfoolery

**Jive** duck and dive

**Job** corn on the cob, couple of bob, knocker and knob

**Jock (Scotsman)** sweaty sock

**Johnny (condom)** Reggie and Ronnie

**Joke** can of Coke, egg yolk

**Joker (playing cards)** tapioca

**Judge** Barnaby Rudge, chocolate fudge, inky smudge, smear and smudge

**Jury** tomato purée

### K

**Karaoke** hokey cokey

**Keen** James Dean

**Kettle** Hansel and Gretel, stinging nettle

**Key** Bruce Lee

**Keys** Cheddar cheese, dancing fleas, honey bees, knobbly knees

**Khazi** (see **Bog** )

**Kid (child)** dustbin lid, God forbid, saucepan lid

**King (playing cards)** Highland fling

**Kip (sleep)** jockey's whip, lucky dip, Sherbet Dip, Walnut Whip

**Kipper** Jack the Ripper

**Kiss** heavenly bliss, hit and miss

**Kitty** Walter Mitty

**Knackered** cream crackered

**Knees** biscuits and cheese, chips and peas

**Knickers (Bloomers, Drawers)** Alan Whickers, Bill Stickers, wicked rumours, Diana Dors

**Knife** drum and fife, man and wife

**Kraut (German)** lager lout

### L

**Laces** dirty faces

**Ladder** Blackadder

**Ladies' (toilet)** Rosie O'Grady's

**Lager** (see **Beer** )

**Lamb** Uncle Sam

**Lark** Joan of Arc, Noah's Ark

**Late** tiddler's bait

**Later** alligator

**Lather (state)** how's your father?

**Laugh** giraffe, Turkish bath

**Lawyer** Tom Sawyer

**Lazy** Gert and Daisy

**Legs (Pins)** bacon and eggs, clothes pegs, cribbage pegs, pin pegs, Scotch eggs, Scotch pegs, Rin Tin Tins

**Leicester Square** Euan Blair

**Liar** Bob Cryer, deep fat fryer, Dunlop tyre, town crier

**Lie** cherry pie, collar and tie

**Lies** pork pies

**Light (ale)** (see **Beer** )

**Lips** apple pips

**Lisp** Quentin Crisp

**Liver** bow and quiver, Swanee River

**Loan shark** Cutty Sark

**Lodger** Artful Dodger, Jolly Roger

**Look** butcher's hook, Captain Cook

**Loon** Keith Moon

**Loose** Mother Goose

**Loot** whistle and toot

**Lorry** sad and sorry

**Lost** turned and tossed

**Love** turtle dove

**Lunch** kidney punch

### M

**Mad** Mum and Dad

**Magistrate (Beak)** garden gate, bubble and squeak

**Married** cash and carried

**Mason** David Jason, Larry Grayson

**Match** down the hatch

**Matches** cuts and scratches

**Mate** china plate, dinner plate

**Meat** hands and feet

**Medicine** Thomas Edison

**Mental** chicken oriental, Radio Rental

**Merry** Tom and Jerry

**Mess** Eliot Ness, Rudolf Hess

**Mike (microphone)** Yorkshire Tyke

**Mild** (see **Beer** )

**Milk** Acker Bilk, lady in silk, satin and silk, yellow silk

**Mind** bacon rind

**Missus** (see **Wife** )

**Mobi (mobile phone)** Obi-Wan Kenobi

**Money (Dosh, Dough, Wad, Wedge)** bees and honey, bread and honey, Bugs Bunny, Easter bunny, Rogan Josh, Ken Dodd, Percy Sledge

**Moody** Punch and Judy

**Moon** silver spoon

**Motor** (see **Car** )

**Moustache** dot and dash

**Mouth** north and south

**Muddle** kiss and cuddle

**Mug (drinking)** barge and tug

**Mug (fool)** steam tug, stone jug, Toby jug

**Mum** finger and thumb

**Murder** iron girder

**Muscles** greens and brussels

**Mutton** Billy Button

### N

**Nag** paper bag

**Nail** monkey's tail

**Nark (police informant)** (see **Grass** )

**Neck** bushel and peck

**Neighbour** hard labour

**Nerves** West Ham Reserves

**News** bottle of booze, wooden pews

**Newspaper** linen draper

**Nice** sugar and spice

**Nick** (see **Jail** )

**Night** black and white

**Nightie** God almighty

**Nine** Brighton line

**Nipper (child)** fly tipper

**Noise** box of toys, girls and boys

**Noodles** Yankee Doodles

**Nose (Conk, Hooter)** doublet and hose, fireman's hose, I suppose, Tokyo Rose, glass of plonk, pea shooter

**Nun** hot cross bun

**Nutter** brandy butter, bread and butter, peanut butter

**Nutty** chip butty

### O

**Oats** John O'Groats

**Oil** ruin and spoil

**Old** silver and gold

**Old man (husband or father)** frying pan, pot and pan

**On the cheap** Sooty and Sweep

**On the labour (exchange)** beggar my neighbour

**On the pull** John Bull

**On your own** (see **Alone** )

**One** buttered bun

**Onions** corns and bunions

**Organ (musical)** Captain Morgan

**Over** White Cliffs of Dover

### P

**Paddy (Irishman)** goodie and baddie, tea caddy

**Pain** Hanger Lane, Michael Caine

**Pants** Adam Ants, fleas and ants, Pirates of Penzance

**Paper** skyscraper

**Park** Noah's Ark

**Park (a vehicle)** skylark

**Parole** jam roll

**Party** hale and hearty, Moriarty

**Pathetic** Charlton Athletic

**Peck (kiss)** Tooting Bec

**Pen** Dirty Den

**Pension** stand to attention

**Pepper** dirty leper

**Pest** string vest

**Phone (Blower)** Darby and Joan, dog and bone, eau de Cologne, jelly bone, trombone, Percy Thrower

**Photo** kipper and bloater

**Piano** Joanna

**Pick (tool)** Paddy and Mick

**Pickle** slap and tickle

**Pickles** Harvey Nichols

**Pie** Captain Bligh, smack in the eye

**Pillow** weeping willow

**Pinch (steal)** half-inch

**Pink (snooker ball)** rinky dink

**Pins** (see **Legs** )

**Pipe** cherry ripe

**Pitch** hedge and ditch

**Pizza** Mona Lisa

**Plan** Jackie Chan, Manfred Mann

**Plants** uncles and aunts

**Plastered** (see **Drunk** )

**Plate** Alexander the Great, Pearly Gate

**Play (theatrical)** Evelyn Laye

**Please** hairy knees

**Plug** little brown jug

**Pocket** chain and locket, Davy Crockett, Lucy Locket, penny locket, sky rocket

**Poker** jolly joker

**Pong** (see **Smell** )

**Pony (£25)** macaroni

**Poor** on the floor

**Pope** bar of soap

**Port (wine)** didn't ought

**Poser** bulldozer, Carl Rosa

**Post (mail)** beans on toast, Holy Ghost, Sunday roast, tea and toast

**Potato (Spuds)** Spanish waiter, Roy Hudds

**Pound** Huckleberry Hound, lost and found, merry-go-round

**Pox** boots and socks, cardboard box, Dairy Box, East India Docks, Goldilocks, Jack in the box, Surrey Docks

**Prat** mackerel and sprat, top hat

**Prayer** chocolate éclair, weaver's chair

**Price** snow and ice

**Priest** bag of yeast

**Pub (Boozer)** nuclear sub, rub-a-dub, battle cruiser

**Puff** Nellie Duff

**Pull (chat up)** cotton wool

**Punter** Billy Bunter

**Purse** doctor and nurse

**Pyjamas** panoramas

### Q

**Quack (doctor)** Uncle Mac

**Queen (Elizabeth II)** baked bean

**Quid (£1)** bin lid

### R

**Rain** pleasure and pain

**Rave** Comedy Dave

**Raver** cheesy Quaver

**Razor** Frankie Fraser

**Readies** (see **Cash** )

**Red (snooker ball)** bald head

**Rent** Duke of Kent

**Ride** Charlie Pride

**Right** harbour light, Isle of Wight

**Ring (jewellery)** Highland fling, ting-a-ling

**Rip** acid trip

**River** shake and shiver

**Road** frog and toad

**Room** bride and groom

**Rough** Mickey Duff

**Round (of drinks)** hare and hound

**Row (argument)** bull and cow, pantomime cow

**Rum** finger and thumb, Tom Thumb

**Rummage** Worzel Gummidge

**Runs** (see **Diarrhoea** )

### S

**Sack** last card of the pack, Roberta Flack, tin tack

**Sad** Alan Ladd

**Salad** romantic ballad

**Saloon bar** balloon car

**Salt** Earls Court, squad halt

**Sandals** Roman candles

**Sauce** Air Force, rocking horse

**Saucer** Geoffrey Chaucer

**Saveloy** Myrna Loy

**Saw** bear's paw, mother-in-law

**Say so** cocoa

**Scar** Mars bar

**Scarf** centre-half, half and half, tin bath

**Scary** Bloody Mary

**Score (£20)** Bobby Moore

**Scotch** (see **Whisky** )

**Scouser** Mickey Mouser

**Sea** housemaid's knee

**Sense** pounds and pence, shillings and pence

**Shabby** Westminster Abbey

**Shades (sunglasses)** Jack of Spades

**Shakes, the** Hattie Jacques

**Shandy** Andy Pandy, Beano and Dandy

**Shares** Rupert Bears

**Shave** Chas and Dave, Mexican wave, ocean wave, rant and rave

**Shilling (Bob)** rogue and villain, Thomas Tilling, doorknob

**Shiner (black eye)** Morris Minor, ocean liner

**Ship** halfpenny dip

**Shirt** dicky dirt, Uncle Bert

**Shoe** Winnie the Pooh

**Shoes** five to twos, Looby Loos, ones and twos, rhythm and blues, St Louis blues

**Shooter (gun)** Phil the Fluter

**Shop** lollipop, Mrs Mopp

**Short (drink)** magistrate's court

**Shoulders** Noddy Holders, rocks and boulders

**Shout** brussel sprout

**Shovel** Lord Lovell

**Shower** Blackpool Tower, Eiffel Tower

**Shrimp** Colonel Blimp

**Shut** Jabba the Hutt

**Sick** Moby Dick, spotted dick, Tom and Dick

**Silly** daffadown dilly, Piccadilly, Uncle Willy

**Singer** mangle and wringer

**Sister** skin and blister

**Six** pick up sticks

**Sixty-six** clickety click

**Skint** Bernie Flint, boracic lint, Murray mint, Polo mint

**Skiver** backseat driver

**Skoda** whisky and soda

**Sky** shepherd's pie

**Slammer** (see **Jail** )

**Slap** brandy snap, Watford Gap

**Slaughtered** (see **Drunk** )

**Sleep** Bo Peep

**Slippers** big dippers, Jack the Rippers, pair of kippers

**Smart** lemon tart

**Smashed** (see **Drunk** )

**Smell (Pong, Stink, Whiff)** heaven and hell, William Tell, Anna May Wong, pen and ink, Jimmy Cliff

**Smoke** cough and choke

**Smoke (cigarette)** (see **Fag** )

**Smoke (London)** old oak

**Snake** George Blake

**Sneeze** bread and cheese

**Snore** lion's roar

**Snout** (see **Tobacco** )

**Snow** buck and doe

**Snuff** blindman's buff

**Soap** Band of Hope, Bob Hope

**Socks** almond rocks, diamond rocks, Tilbury Docks

**Son** bath bun, currant bun

**Song** ding dong

**Sores** Dudley Moores

**Soup** bowl the hoop, loop the loop

**Sparrow** bow and arrow

**Spats** Wanstead Flats

**Speak** bubble and squeak

**Specs** (see **Glasses** )

**Speech** Southend beach

**Spinach** Woolwich and Greenwich

**Splinter** Harold Pinter

**Spoon** blue moon, Lorna Doone, man on the moon

**Spot** jelly tot, Randolph Scott

**Spouse** boiler house

**Spuds** (see **Potato** )

**Squatter** pig's trotter

**Squeal (inform on)** conger eel

**Stab** doner kebab

**Stain** Cynthia Payne, Michael Caine

**Stairs** apples and pears, dancing bears, troubles and cares

**Starvin'** Hank Marvin

**State (mess)** two and eight

**Station** poor relation

**Stays (corset)** Bryant and Mays

**Steak** Joe Blake

**Steak and kidney** Kate and Sidney

**Stew** Battle of Waterloo

**Stink** (see **Smell** )

**Stocking** reeling and rocking, simply shocking

**Stolen goods** Little Red Riding Hoods

**Stool** Peter O'Toole

**Stop thief** hot beef

**Story** Jackanory

**Stout** (see **Beer** )

**Straight** six and eight

**Stranger** Glasgow Ranger, Queens Park Ranger

**Street** ain't it a treat, field of wheat

**Stretch** Jack Ketch

**Strides** (see **Trousers** )

**Stripper** herring and kipper

**Strop** whip and top

**Stunner** air gunner

**Style** Tate and Lyle

**Sub (pay advance)** rub-a-dub

**Sucker** Tommy Tucker

**Suit** bowl of fruit, whistle and flute

**Sulk** Incredible Hulk

**Sun** bath bun, currant bun

**Sun (newspaper)** currant bun

**Suspenders** no surrenders

**Swear** Lord Mayor, rip and tear

**Sweetheart** treacle tart

### T

**Table** Betty Grable, Cain and Abel

**Taff (Welshman)** riff raff

**Tail** alderman's nail

**Tailor** Sinbad the Sailor

**Tale** Daily Mail, Newgate Gaol

**Talk** Duke of York, rabbit and pork

**Talker** Johnnie Walker, Murray Walker

**Tan** Charlie Chan, Steely Dan

**Tanner (sixpence)** lord of the manor

**Tax** Ajax, bees' wax

**Taxi** (see **Cab** )

**Tea** Rosie Lee, you and me

**Teeth** Edward Heath, Hampstead Heath, roast beef

**Telly (Goggle box)** custard and jelly, Marie Corelli Roger Mellie, Nervo and Knox

**Ten** Big Ben, Bill and Ben, cock and hen, Uncle Ben

**Thick (stupid)** king dick, Paddy and Mick, Queen Vic

**Thief** leg of beef, tea leaf

**Thieves** Jimmy Greaves

**Thin** needle and pin

**Third (degree result)** Douglas Hurd

**Thirst** Geoff Hurst

**Thirty** Burlington Bertie

**Throat** nanny goat

**Throne** (see **Bog** )

**Throttle** water bottle

**Thumb** Jamaica rum

**Thunder** Stevie Wonder, up and under

**Ticket** bat and wicket, Wilson Pickett

**Tiddly** (see **Drunk** )

**Tie** Peckham Rye

**Tights** fly-by-nights, Snow Whites

**Tile** (see **Hat** )

**Till** Benny Hill

**Time** Harry Lime, lager and lime

**Time (prison sentence)** birdlime

**Times (newspaper)** nursery rhymes

**Tired** barb-wired

**Toast** Holy Ghost, Mickie Most

**Toaster** roller coaster

**Tobacco (Snout)** Oi Jimmy Knacker, salmon and trout

**Toes** buttons and bows, Sebastian Coes, these and those

**Tomatoes** Stars and Garters

**Tools** April Fools, Crown Jewels

**Tote** canal boat

**Totty** Bruno N'Gotty

**Towel** Enoch Powell, mortar and trowel, Sandy Powell

**Toy** girl and boy

**Traffic warden** Gay Gordon

**Train** hail and rain, John Wayne, struggle and strain

**Tram** baa lamb, bread and jam

**Tramp** halfpenny stamp, hurricane lamp, paraffin lamp

**Trousers (Strides)** Callard & Bowsers, council houses, round the houses, Herbie Hides, Jekyll and Hydes

**Trowel** Baden-Powell, bark and growl

**True** Irish stew

**Truth** Maud and Ruth

**Tune** stewed prune

**Turk** Captain Kirk

**Turkey** Pinky and Perky

**Twenty** Horn of Plenty

**Twig (understand)** earwig

**Twins** needles and pins

**2:1 (degree result)** Attila the Hun

**2:2 (degree result)** Desmond (Tutu)

**Tyre** Billy Liar

### U

**Umbrella (Brolly)** Auntie Ella, Stan and Ollie

**Undertaker** overcoat maker

### V

**Van** Peter Pan

**Veg** Uncle Reg

**Very best** John West

**Vest** east and west, Wild West

**Vicar** half a nicker, pie and liquor

**Villain** Bob Dylan, Harold Macmillan

**Vin blanc (white wine)** plinkety plonk

**Voddie (vodka)** Bill Oddie

**Voice** William Joyce

### W

**Wad** (see **Money** )

**Wages** greengages, rock of ages

**Waistcoat** Charlie Prescott

**Waiter** cheese grater, hot potato

**Wales** Canterbury Tales

**Walk** ball of chalk, Duke of York

**Watch** bottle of Scotch

**Water** didn't oughta, fisherman's daughter

**Weather** hat and feather

**Web site** wind and kite

**Wedge** (see **Money** )

**Weight** Alfred the Great, pieces of eight

**West (End of London)** jacket and vest

**Wheels (transport)** jellied eels

**Whiff** (see **Smell** )

**Whiskers** hammer and discus

**Whisky (Scotch)** gay and frisky, gold watch, pimple and blotch

**Whistle** Partick Thistle

**Wife (Missus)** bread knife, carving knife, drum and fife, Duchess of Fife, Swiss army knife, trouble and strife, hugs and kisses, love and kisses

**Wig** guinea pig, Irish jig, syrup of fig

**Win** nose and chin

**Window** burnt cinder, Tommy Trinder

**Wine** River Tyne

**Winkles** Granny's wrinkles

**Winner** chicken dinner, hot dinner

**Wishes** pots and dishes

**Woman** gooseberry puddin'

**Woods (Woodbines)** (see **Fag** )

**Word** dicky bird

**Work** Captain Kirk, smile and smirk

**Wrong** Pete Tong

### XYZ

**Yank (American)** board and plank, wooden plank

**Yanks (Americans)** ham shanks

**Years** donkey's ears

**Yes** Brown Bess
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Published in 2019 by Pop Press, an imprint of Ebury Publishing,
20 Vauxhall Bridge Road,
London SW1V 2SA

Pop Press is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at  global.penguinrandomhouse.com.

Text © Geoff Tibballs 2019
Designed by seagulls.net

Geoff Tibballs has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this Work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

First published by Ebury Press in 2008

penguin.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 9781473566873

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