James Hardy Vaux’s 1819 collection of ‘criminal slang and other impolite terms’ is recognised as Australia’s first dictionary. For its 200th anniversary, Simon Barnard has updated the text
If you were one of the 164,000 convicts transported to the Australian colonies, chances are you forked clys for screeves and clouts or worked the hoist to nail lobs and serve coves.
Keeping one step ahead of the law meant being fleet of foot but also quick-witted. Communicating in slang provided criminals with the means to deceive and confuse the authorities. When “cat and kitten stealer” William Dixon fronted court, a police officer politely informed the magistrate that Dixon had not abducted a family of felines but had been caught pinching valuable pewter mugs, so named for the resemblance their bulbous shapes and curved handles bore to cats’ bodies and tails.
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