See peaky blinder on Wiktionary
Download JSON data for peaky blinder meaning in All languages combined (6.3kB)
{
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "blinder",
"3": "",
"4": "exceptional performance"
},
"expansion": "blinder (“exceptional performance”)",
"name": "m"
}
],
"etymology_text": "From the name of a street gang in Birmingham, the Peaky Blinders, who got their name From the peaked caps their members wore, and from blinder (“exceptional performance”) or from the practice of pulling a victims hat over his eyes so that he could not identify his attacker. There is a folk etymology claiming the \"blinder\" part of the name comes from the practice of stitching razor blades or weights into the peak of the cap and using it as a weapon to blind one's opponent, but this has been shown to be apocryphal.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "peaky blinders",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "peaky blinder (plural peaky blinders)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"_dis": "49 17 33",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w+disamb"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1910, Robert Hall Best, William John Davis, Charles Perks, The Brassworkers of Berlin and of Birmingham: A Comparison, page 35",
"text": "They return from camp with new boots, shirt, stockings and money; part of which is spent in excess on their first night's return after training and part goes to purchase a pair of “peaky blinder” trousers.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1984, Midland History - Volumes 9-12, page 108",
"text": "In Birmingham the 'peaky-blinder' and 'slogger' gangs were particularly notorious.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "There is a reference in the Birmingham Daily Gazette to a 'hooligan outrage' in Newton Row in January 1907 - which had formerly been a peaky blinder stronghold - when three men of the peaky blinder type savagely attacked and robbed a businessman late at night, but there appears to be no mention of assaults or fights by peaky blinders after that..",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2016, Dick Hobbs, Mischief, Morality and Mobs, page 94",
"text": "As Arthur Matthison recalled (1937:63), the peaky blinder wore: Bell-bottomed trousers secured by a buckle belt, hob-nailed boots, a jacket of sorts, a gaudy scarf and a billy-cock hat with a long elongated brim.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A member of the Peaky Blinders gang. They operated in Birmingham from the end of the 19th century until after the First World War. Gang members had a distinctive appearance: close-cropped hair, bell-bottomed trousers, peaked caps, and a white scarf knotted at the throat."
],
"id": "en-peaky_blinder-en-noun-42~uXaT1",
"links": [
[
"Peaky Blinders",
"Peaky Blinders"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(historical) A member of the Peaky Blinders gang. They operated in Birmingham from the end of the 19th century until after the First World War. Gang members had a distinctive appearance: close-cropped hair, bell-bottomed trousers, peaked caps, and a white scarf knotted at the throat."
],
"tags": [
"historical"
]
},
{
"categories": [],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1899, The Puritan - Volume 5, page 206",
"text": "So, in London, birds of a feather must flock together, willy nilly, silk hat and frock coat must go with white gloves and brown sables, “peaky blinder and “ choker \" must associate with crop fringed hair, ear curls, and rakish three feathered hat.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1968, Maurice Wiggin, The Memoirs of a Maverick, page 30",
"text": "You could practically hear the rusty wheels whirring round beneath his black peaky blinder.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "The peak of the peaky-blinder was usually slit open and pennies or razor-blades or pieces of slate inserted and stitched up again. The caps, peaky-blinders, were used in fighting to be whipped off the head and swiped across the opponent's eyes, momentarily blinding them or slashing the cheeks.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A peaked cap like that worn by a peaky blinder, especially when worn with the peak pulled down to the side of the head."
],
"id": "en-peaky_blinder-en-noun-FhCNggEa",
"links": [
[
"peaked",
"peaked"
],
[
"cap",
"cap"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(archaic) A peaked cap like that worn by a peaky blinder, especially when worn with the peak pulled down to the side of the head."
],
"tags": [
"archaic"
]
},
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Birmingham English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1908, The Spectator - Volume 101, page 781",
"text": "Probably the \"hooligan\" of London need not cost more to redeem than the \" ike \" of Manchester or the \"peaky blinder\" of Birmingham; the differences in expense lie in the method.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1914, Pharmaceutical Journal - Volume 37, page 262",
"text": "Hundreds of girls and youths, mainly of the “ peaky blinder ” type, parade the streets—sometimes half a dozen arm-in-arm across the pavements.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "There is a reference in the Birmingham Daily Gazette to a 'hooligan outrage' in Newton Row in January 1907 - which had formerly been a peaky blinder stronghold - when three men of the peaky blinder type savagely attacked and robbed a businessman late at night, but there appears to be no mention of assaults or fights by peaky blinders after that..",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1964, Charles Frederick Victor Smout, The story of the progress of medicine, page 137",
"text": "Nights on the district were nightmares. Peaky-blinder warrens down which the police daren't venture, except in twos; drunken gamp midwives under the bed, and often a race betwen half-an-inch of a guttering candle and a dawn two hours away, the patient indulging in a P.P.H., little or no water and no one to send for help.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Any ruffian or street gang member."
],
"id": "en-peaky_blinder-en-noun-XLOcykNo",
"links": [
[
"ruffian",
"ruffian"
],
[
"street gang",
"street gang"
]
],
"qualifier": "Birmingham",
"raw_glosses": [
"(Birmingham) Any ruffian or street gang member."
]
}
],
"wikipedia": [
"Peaky Blinders"
],
"word": "peaky blinder"
}
{
"categories": [
"English countable nouns",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English nouns"
],
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "blinder",
"3": "",
"4": "exceptional performance"
},
"expansion": "blinder (“exceptional performance”)",
"name": "m"
}
],
"etymology_text": "From the name of a street gang in Birmingham, the Peaky Blinders, who got their name From the peaked caps their members wore, and from blinder (“exceptional performance”) or from the practice of pulling a victims hat over his eyes so that he could not identify his attacker. There is a folk etymology claiming the \"blinder\" part of the name comes from the practice of stitching razor blades or weights into the peak of the cap and using it as a weapon to blind one's opponent, but this has been shown to be apocryphal.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "peaky blinders",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "peaky blinder (plural peaky blinders)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English terms with historical senses",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1910, Robert Hall Best, William John Davis, Charles Perks, The Brassworkers of Berlin and of Birmingham: A Comparison, page 35",
"text": "They return from camp with new boots, shirt, stockings and money; part of which is spent in excess on their first night's return after training and part goes to purchase a pair of “peaky blinder” trousers.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1984, Midland History - Volumes 9-12, page 108",
"text": "In Birmingham the 'peaky-blinder' and 'slogger' gangs were particularly notorious.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "There is a reference in the Birmingham Daily Gazette to a 'hooligan outrage' in Newton Row in January 1907 - which had formerly been a peaky blinder stronghold - when three men of the peaky blinder type savagely attacked and robbed a businessman late at night, but there appears to be no mention of assaults or fights by peaky blinders after that..",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2016, Dick Hobbs, Mischief, Morality and Mobs, page 94",
"text": "As Arthur Matthison recalled (1937:63), the peaky blinder wore: Bell-bottomed trousers secured by a buckle belt, hob-nailed boots, a jacket of sorts, a gaudy scarf and a billy-cock hat with a long elongated brim.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A member of the Peaky Blinders gang. They operated in Birmingham from the end of the 19th century until after the First World War. Gang members had a distinctive appearance: close-cropped hair, bell-bottomed trousers, peaked caps, and a white scarf knotted at the throat."
],
"links": [
[
"Peaky Blinders",
"Peaky Blinders"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(historical) A member of the Peaky Blinders gang. They operated in Birmingham from the end of the 19th century until after the First World War. Gang members had a distinctive appearance: close-cropped hair, bell-bottomed trousers, peaked caps, and a white scarf knotted at the throat."
],
"tags": [
"historical"
]
},
{
"categories": [
"English terms with archaic senses",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1899, The Puritan - Volume 5, page 206",
"text": "So, in London, birds of a feather must flock together, willy nilly, silk hat and frock coat must go with white gloves and brown sables, “peaky blinder and “ choker \" must associate with crop fringed hair, ear curls, and rakish three feathered hat.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1968, Maurice Wiggin, The Memoirs of a Maverick, page 30",
"text": "You could practically hear the rusty wheels whirring round beneath his black peaky blinder.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "The peak of the peaky-blinder was usually slit open and pennies or razor-blades or pieces of slate inserted and stitched up again. The caps, peaky-blinders, were used in fighting to be whipped off the head and swiped across the opponent's eyes, momentarily blinding them or slashing the cheeks.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A peaked cap like that worn by a peaky blinder, especially when worn with the peak pulled down to the side of the head."
],
"links": [
[
"peaked",
"peaked"
],
[
"cap",
"cap"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(archaic) A peaked cap like that worn by a peaky blinder, especially when worn with the peak pulled down to the side of the head."
],
"tags": [
"archaic"
]
},
{
"categories": [
"Birmingham English",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1908, The Spectator - Volume 101, page 781",
"text": "Probably the \"hooligan\" of London need not cost more to redeem than the \" ike \" of Manchester or the \"peaky blinder\" of Birmingham; the differences in expense lie in the method.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1914, Pharmaceutical Journal - Volume 37, page 262",
"text": "Hundreds of girls and youths, mainly of the “ peaky blinder ” type, parade the streets—sometimes half a dozen arm-in-arm across the pavements.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2019, Carl Chinn, Peaky Blinders - The Real Story of Birmingham's most notorious gangs.",
"text": "There is a reference in the Birmingham Daily Gazette to a 'hooligan outrage' in Newton Row in January 1907 - which had formerly been a peaky blinder stronghold - when three men of the peaky blinder type savagely attacked and robbed a businessman late at night, but there appears to be no mention of assaults or fights by peaky blinders after that..",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1964, Charles Frederick Victor Smout, The story of the progress of medicine, page 137",
"text": "Nights on the district were nightmares. Peaky-blinder warrens down which the police daren't venture, except in twos; drunken gamp midwives under the bed, and often a race betwen half-an-inch of a guttering candle and a dawn two hours away, the patient indulging in a P.P.H., little or no water and no one to send for help.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Any ruffian or street gang member."
],
"links": [
[
"ruffian",
"ruffian"
],
[
"street gang",
"street gang"
]
],
"qualifier": "Birmingham",
"raw_glosses": [
"(Birmingham) Any ruffian or street gang member."
]
}
],
"wikipedia": [
"Peaky Blinders"
],
"word": "peaky blinder"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-10 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (a644e18 and edd475d). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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