An American Guide to Cockney Rhyming Slang

MAIN Travel Destinations London Tourist Attractions

The American Guide to Cockney Slang

Officially, cockney is the term used to describe any person born within the sound of the Bow Bells - the bells of St. Mary-Le-Bow Church ("Bow Church") in Cheapside, London.

However, cockney slang is used all over London, extensively in England and around the U.K. and even heard in parts of Ireland.

Cockney Slang: Apples and Pears = Stairs Cockney slang's history goes at least as far back as St. Mary Le-Bow, and maybe longer. It is thought to have originated from sailors who loitered around London docks, or from the Gypsies, the Irish, or any other mix of nationalities that made up the London neighborhood at the time.

No Cockney, Please. We're American.

For more complete background on the more colorful expressions used by today's Cockney Londoners, you are urged to follow the selected links to cockney slang further down the page. These cover most of the terms available in the modern cockney lexicon, or for describing various elimination processes, sexual piccadillos and states of inebriation by degree. For now, here's the more Puritan entries:

An American (Cleaned Up) Guide to Cockney Slang

Around the Hotel

Apples & Pears - stairs
Dickory Dock - clock
Dog and Bone - telephone
Henry Moore - door
Lion's Lair - chair
Uncle Ned - bed

At The Table

Army and Navy - gravy
Cain and Abel - table
Holy Ghost - toast
Jack the Ripper - kipper
Rosie Lee - tea
Steam Tug - mug

In the Pub

Aristotle - bottle
Battlecruiser - boozer (pub)
Elephants Trunk - drunk
Fine and Dandy - brandy
Finger and Thumb - rum
Fishermans Daughter - water
Gold Watch - scotch
Pigs Ear - beer
Plink-Plonk - vin Blanc (wine,
a bottle of plonk, please.)
Rub-a-Dub - pub
Salmon and Trout - stout
Tiddlywink - drink
Vera Lynn - gin

Shopping

April Showers - flowers
Dicky Dirt - shirt
East and West - vest
Irish Jig - wig
Linen Draper - newspaper (readin' the linen he was)
Oily Rag - fag (cigarette, also cough and drag, Harry Wragg)
Sausage and Mash - cash (also, Arthur Ashe)
Tit for Tat - hat (titfer)
Turtle Doves - gloves
Whistle and Flute - suit

Miscellaneous

Brixton Riot - diet
China Plate - mate ('ello me ol' china!)
Dicky Bird - word (Wouldn't say a Dicky Bird)
Bread and Honey - money
Frog and Toad - road
Rabbit and Pork - walk
Rubic's Cube - the Tube, the Underground (also, Oxo Cube)
Septic Tank - Yank, American. (also, Wooden Plank)
Todd Sloane - on your own (on yer Todd)

More Web Sites of Interest:

BBCAmerica - Dictionary
A Cockney Rhyming Slang Dictionary
Cockney Rhyming Slang
Cockney Online

also see in Travel -> England | London Tourist Attractions