Colloquial Sayings & Slangugae
Born under dubious circumstances in 1788, Sydney didn’t take long to realise its potential. 64 years later, it celebrated when, in 1842, Governor Gipps sealed an Act declaring the township of Sydney to be Australia’s first city. Twenty-two days later, Melbourne was declared a town – they always were a little slower than us.
Our first Europeans settled in The Rocks and Millers Point so they could look out onto the ‘world’s greatest harbour’. Government House was built to the east, and the convicts were sent to the west – the original westies. We didn’t bother going north – we were waiting for the bridge. And, well, the Shire was a long way away.
Over the years, Sydneysiders have been described as arrogant, brash, larrikins and, god forbid, snobs. How very dare they! Okay, Sydney snobbery is mostly seen in real estate – suburbs define us with some shouting: ‘Be rich. get rich or get out’. We are, of course, the greatest city in the world and, sadly, one of the most expensive. Did you know a pie ‘with the works’ from Harry’s Cafe de Wheels is now nearly $10. On the bright side we have lots of free sunshine, surf, trees and water.
What is a Sydneysider?
We come from all points north, south, east and west. We celebrate our great ‘stew pot’ of over 250 ethnic and cultural groups, and our main languages are English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Arabic, Greek, Vietnamese and Slanguage. And we love to take the piss out of ourselves – and others.
Easties live in the east – Double Pay, Bellejew Hill, Nose Bay, Bondi Junkland, The Bra, Slurry Hills, Darling-it-hurts, The ‘Loo, Betty Bay, Poof’s Point, and it’s naughty little sister, Kink’s Cross.
Others prefer to be southies in ‘god’s own’ – The Shire – surf at Cronullfornina or travel the BBQ belt along Transylvania Waters.
For some the inner west is home sweet home – Hippendale, Zootown, Marrickvile, Cankerberry, Trashfield and out to Stratty and Lebkemba. Take a right wrong turn and you end up headed for Effing and the Hills District: Baulkham Hillsong up to Pimple.
Or you could head north to Mordor (anywhere over the bridge) to the North Snore, up the Wanker’s Parkway, through Chatswoo, and right up the Bilgola Bends to the Insular Peninsula Narra and Palmie.
Then there’s the west, home of the famous westies although no one seems to know where the west starts or ends…— Directions – take the Middle Eastern Distributor past suburbs like Scramperdown, Hashfield, Burwoo, Vietnamatta (Stabramatta) and further afield to Gangstown, Scarrytown, Scrambletown and, as many of us know, the ‘other city’ – Parra Does’n’t-Matta..
Wherever you live – as several people have observed – including Norm Erskine and Paul Keating – “If you’re not living in Sydney – you’re camping out!”
The first ‘locals’ were, of course, the indigenous owners of this land, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, and then came a few convicts – Tom, Dick and Harry and Black-eyed Betsy, Molly and Saucy Sue – followed by a motley crew of soldiers, marines, and public servants. Governor Lachlan Macquarie was right “Australia was settled by people who were sentenced here and those who should have been.” — What a start to build a nation!
The new arrivals, we called ourselves ‘cornstalks’ because, with hard work, sunshine, and occasionally decent tucker, we sprouted up like the proverbial cornstalk – took one look at the harbour bridge, opera house and harbour and declared Sydney as a good spot for a city.
We weren’t bananabenders, yarra drinkers, sandgropers, Territorians, apple-eaters, crow eaters OR snobs, and we soon learnt that colonial born was better than sterling bred.
Sydney certainly celebrated down through the years.
We celebrated transitioning from penal colony to ‘bright new land’ as farm settlements edged into the bush.
We celebrated when the sound of ‘Rush Away’ echoed across Sydney, then the world, as gold diggers, desperate to strike it rich, added nearly a million and a half people to Australia – in just two decades. Some did strike it rich, however, as the old diggers soon realised – there was a lot of gold out there .. and a bloody of a lot of earth mixed in with it.
The diggers sure knew how to celebrate – many a goldminer, in Sydney to celebrate, ordered a bucket of French champagne and two slices of bread – then proceeded to make a ten pound note sandwich, which they ate washed down with champagne. Don’t tell me we don’t know how to party!
We celebrated the federation of the colonies when they came together in 1901 – a grand parade snaked through Sydney led by a gang of shearers – a salute to the mighty men who had carried Australia from the golden years to pastural boom times. Nowadays accountants, bankers and stockbrokers would probably want to lead the parade waving their red pencils.
Sydney. The old-time bushies called it the city of 4 ‘g’s’ – glass, girls, grog and galahs.
We continued to celebrate through the twentieth century – at the end of two world wars, during the roaring twenties
By the 1920s Sydney had grown up and already considered brash with a somewhat dangerous larrikin spirit – especially compared to staid old Melbourne on the banks of the Yarra (the only river that flows upside-down), Hobart, well, it wasn’t on our radar, Adelaide, the city of churches didn’t have much of a reputation for fun, Perth, too far away, Brisbane, well, it’s still a bush town. And as for Canberra – a good sheep station ruined!
We had grown up (a little), learnt a lot, we even had a State emblem, The Waratah.
The great Henry Lawson raised a salute to the Waratah.
You may sing of the Shamrock, the Thistle, the Rose,
Or the three in a bunch, if you will;
But I know of a country that gathered all those,
And I love the great land where the Waratah grows.
And the Wattle-bough blooms on the hill.
Some other wit added:
The sweet Australian wattle is the emblem of our land,
You can stick it in a bottle, or wave it in your hand.
Some say Sydney stinks – All cities have a smell, or several smells, that identify the urban environment. In colonial times there was an overriding smell, or stench, of horse and bullock manure, the beasts being a vital part of our transport and cartage history. In the early 20th century, the main smell was created by steam trains and the pervasive stench of coke, the main fuel for heating factory and household water. Suburbs were known for their smell, particularly the Balmain soap factory or the Waterloo tanneries. Other smells became friends – the Arnott’s Biscuit factory on Parramatta Road, food halls of department stores, bookshops, boot-makers and delicatessens. In many ways our public stink has been replaced by motor fumes but with a good snout, you can still sniff our unique Sydney smells. If the smells are too overpowering a visit to the Botanical Gardens is a sure remedy.
Then there’s the traffic. Research shows Sydney drivers are some of the world’s angriest drivers. Driven by frustration with traffic congestion, we arrive late with teeth grating and nerves frazzled. We all need to chill out a bit until the transport dream has been fulfilled: a second cross-harbour tunnel, a northern beaches metro rail line and a few more of those M-whatever-they-are expressways. Honking and screaming don’t help. A chill pill, anyone?
Sydneysiders are renowned for being relaxed. We’re not at snobbish Some folk get a bit hot under the collar sometimes and one issue on the end of our tongues seems to be that pesky ‘immigration’. Hey! we are all bloomin’ immigrants of some sort (except for our indigenous brethren) so let’s try and get along. We are lucky to live in a city with so many ethnic and cultural roots. Multiculturalism adds vitality and also tastes good! Indian, Asian, Middle Eastern, European, African and all the other flavours spice up our lives.
One thing’s for sure – we love slanguage and our colourful colloquial expressions. Tall poppies don’t stand a chance when we cut them down to size with “He’s got a dial like Luna Park”, “He wouldn’t know if it’s Pitt Street or Christmas’ or, and this could only be Sydney, “He’s got a mouth like the Harbour Bridge”. Women cop it too – “She’s so ugly even the tide at Bondi wouldn’t take ‘er out”.
Well, it’s time I hit the ‘frog and toad’ – I’m going to shoot through like a Bondi Tram’ – yes, “I’m off like a bag of prawns in the sun.”
This collection of words and phrases is an attempt to capture the usage of the spoken language of the era in which I grew up, and am still learning the everyday communications of the people who were my parents, their peers & co-inhabitants, my schoolmates and workmates, at the start of the closing of the era of the wireless as being the public communications system to, for, and from all the people of Australia, nationwide. It is not constrained to that era, as I have endeavoured to include “modern” Australianisms which have evolved during my lifetime.
I hope the Fsh & Chp eaters of the Rickety Isles don’t feel offndd by any non inclusions, and I wld grtly wlcome their inpt as a fulfilling adjunct to specialities of us Antipodeans of vastly different original backgrounds, but so closely allied by our mutual independence.
I am not about stifling the natural growth of Language, which is forever evolving and expanding, but without the preservation of an era of a language, tis like having a missing rung in your ladder.
This lexicon is not meant to be definitive (as our language ain’t) and ought not be viewed as rigid in any of the meanings I append to any words or phrases. I am well travelled about Oz, and fully recognise the nuances of the regional applications and spellings of words and phrases. For those I have omitted I mean not to offend, but culling is like having a boyang missing in a paddock full of ferrets….keeps ya hopping.
THE AIM OF THIS LEXICON
The aim of this Lexicon is to energise and invigorate antipodeans (Aussies & Kiwis) in the effort of the preservation of our Antipodean Uniqueness, and not be over-run by outside monopolies and their tacit ploy to make us clones of their companyism.
W.A., as do other States, has a special place here, as it is the interface with all from the North and West, and must have accumulated lots of colloquiums which should be recorded for our mutual history.
Please feel free to add to this small collection, and to expand it into a formidable counter to being linguistically destroyed, as have others who have suffered the touch of the Bald Eagle and other uncaring monopolies.
I am grateful to contributor Alan Chapman for compiling this Lexicon. Alan claims Kiwi heritage – he’s a kimu’ – and readers will find many of the words in the lexicon common to both counties.
| AS HARD AS A GOATS KNEES: | Meaning to be very tough and resilient, able to withstand and survive the difficulties & rigours life presents. | |
| AS QUICK AS SHIT FROM A SHANGHAI: | Some body or thing which moves at a really fast rate. In metropolis we had tarred roads, from the sides of which we could pick up small residue drops of pig iron to use as projectiles in our shanghais (otherwise known as “gonks”). Our country cousins had to use the dried, and very hard, kangaroo, sheep, fox, and rabbit droppings for the same purpose, hence the expression. | |
| AS THE CROW FLIES; | The reckoned shortest distance from here to there, but may have little relevance to the actual travellable distance. | |
| ASHTRAY ON A MOTORBIKE: | A typical expression to describe someone or something as being particularly useless. | |
| AYE (or EH): | That peculiarly Queensland suffix to a sentence in speech. | |
| BACK OF BEYOND: | That undefinable place which is even further away than the NEVER NEVER. | |
| BAG (SOMEBODY OR THING): | To BAG someone or something is to give them/it a very lowly place in your estimation. | |
| BAG O’ FRUIT: | A suit (of clothing for a man). | |
| BAGS: | To lay 1st claim to something, as in, “Bags I lick the pudding bowl”. | |
| BANANA BENDER: | A person from the state of Queensland, where bananas were originally grown in Oz. | |
| BARBIE: | This has nothing to do with a child’s doll of yesteryear, but is what YOUSE may be invited to, where the men cook, burn, and bugger the various meat offerings and toss back a few TINNIES, whilst their women look on in despair, and toss the salad. | |
| BARGE POLE; | That undefined length which one wishes to distance themself from another person or situation. In reality, a BARGE POLE (a pole for propelling a barge in shallow waters) was about 20 feet, or 6 metres long. | |
| BARKER’S EGGS: | That which your dog leaves on your neighbour’s lawn. | |
| BARNIE: | A verbal altercation. | |
| BEANIE: | A woollen (usually knitted) head covering, of plain or many-coloured pattern, worn in cold weather, which has now become a symbol for different groups, and about which festivals have grown, mainly in The Center. | |
| BEE’S KNEES: | Aptly suitable. Quite fitting the occasion. | |
| BEFORE YOU CAN SAY “JACK ROBINSON”: | Refers to something which is about to happen quite quickly or very soon. | |
| BENDER: | Bending the elbow…a hard drinking session, but not as serious as a BLINDER. | |
| BIGHT: | To put the Bight on somebody is to ask them for a “loan” of something which you don’t have, usually money, and there seems to be an understanding that the loan, or Bight, is not expected by either party to be repaid. | |
| BILLABONG: | That magical place of a waterhole in arid surrounds, often encircled by gum and acacia trees, where one can find water most of the year, and is often the home and watering place of the BUNYIP. | |
| BILLY CART: | A home made down hill kids racer, usually made from a smallish wooden box set upon a timber frame, with two wheels at the back, and two steerable wheels (controlled by rope) at the front. Mine had no brakes, so the only way of stopping was to run off the road into the grass and dirt. This often led to much shredding of elbows and knees. | |
| BILLY LID: | A child….a kid | |
| BLACK AS THE INSIDES OF A TARANAKI COW: | This is an expression I learned quite young, when trans Tasman communication was the best way to keep The Colony and The Dominion together. Taranaki cows (from my observations) were all black on the outside, hence….. | |
| BLACK AS THUNDER: | The look one portrays to others when they are extremely angry, but not saying so. It is a perceived attitude. | |
| BLACK DOG FOR A WHITE MONKEY: | Usually constrained to a maritime environment, meaning a fair exchange with no cheatery | |
| BLACK PAN: | A basically maritime expression for when the 4 to 8 p.m. watchkeepers had their evening meal after their watch. The apprentices(always very hungry) were allowed to partake if they cleaned all the black pans & left the galley clean. | |
| BLACK STUMP: | That which marks the place beyond which is nothing but the Never Never. Beyond The Outback. | |
| BLINDER: | A very serious drinking session, often occasioned by seamen when they were Paid-Off at the end of a voyage, or when a shearer or other outback worker received their pay cheque. A blinder could often last for a couple of days. | |
| BLOCK: | That which sits upon ya neck, and ya can “Do’, or “Lose”, in a moment of stress. |
| BLOKE: | Any Australian male. This term has both endearing and derogatory applications, depending on the context of its use. It is now sometimes used to embrace all those present, in the plural, including females. |
| BLOODY: | An expletive to stress the importance of the next word or phrase. It is not considered offensive, except if used in the Most Proper of circumstances. It is said that it is a derivative of the old English expression, “By my Lady”, referring to the Queen at the time, Victoria. |
| BLOW YER STACK: | Lose your cool…rant and rave. Go TROPPO. |
| BLUDGE/BLUDGER: | To Bludge, is to expect somebody else to do your share of the work or duty/responsibility, and is a most lowly status amongst a work group. To be called a Bludger is a gross insult. |
| BLUE ORCHIDS: | A colloquial Services name appended to the RAAF flying corpse, because of their” perceived delicacy,” aloofness, and the light blue colour of their dress uniforms”. |
| BLUE/BLUEY; | In this application the words refer to a person by name, other than their given name. (Seems to be a natural phenomena of antipodeanism). Howsomever, if a person (Usually of Celtic stock) has fair skin, red hair, freckles, and blue eyes, they are sure to be known at some time in their life as “Blue” or “Bluey”. The other Bluey is what the swaggies humped on their shoulder…their bed roll. |
| BLUE: | You can get into a Blue with ya Missus, Mates, ya boss, or at ya Local. Having a Blue is a good thing, cos it can be a sorting out , clear the air, before a Stoush ensues. |
| BOB’S Y’ UNCLE: | A term to define that the outcome will be acceptable. |
| BOBBY DAZZLER: | Same as BONZA, BEAUDY BOTTLER, etc. |
| BOG: | The toilet, usually used when one needs to sit to achieve the desired outcome whilst semi recumbent. |
| BOIL THE BILLY: | A Billy is the bushman’s equivalent of the suburban tea pot. To Boil The Billy can be an act to slake ones thirst, or an event to invite others to partake of a social occasion, and Yarn. |
| BOMB; | An automobile of very poor condition. |
| BONZA, OCKER: | As for Bonza, but with particular attention to the other person, being, Ocker. |
| BONZA: | Very good, excellent, just right, the Best. |
| BOTT: | To Bludge a cigarette from another person. |
| BOTTLER: | Things can be Bottlers, or even Beaudy Bottlers. In either case they are extremely pleasing to the beholder. For something to be a” Bloody Beaudy Bottler” puts it above all superiority. |
| BOYANG: | The lashing used to constrain the trouser leg (just below the knees) of a swaggy, or other outback person, to prevent the ingress of snakes, ferrets, grass seeds etc. up the trouser led, which could otherwise cause the person much bother. They also caught what fell through the holes in ya pockets. |
| BRASCO: | A typically male term for the toilet. |
| BRASS MONKEY: | A reference to how cold the weather is. Originally a maritime expression, as the Monkey was the three cornered lipped brass plate to hold cannon balls. When the weather became very cold the monkey would shrink and expel the cannon balls, hence, “Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey”. |
| BRICKFIELDER: | To those on the East & S.E coasts, and those on the West & S.W coasts a Brickfielder is the very hot dry wind which blows from the Dead Centre towards these coastal regions, as if it were coming from a brick kiln. These very high temperatures and dry airs are most often relieved by a Southerly buster (East Coast) and the Fremantle Doctor (west coast). |
| BUSH WEEK: | That unfathomable piece of time where an idea or thought seems to be totally useless. A put-down, as in,”What do ya think this is, Bush Week?” |
| BUTCHER’S HOOK: | Feeling Crook. Or having a look (at something in particular). |
| BY CRIKERY: | An expression of exclamation/surprise. Seems to be a moderation of” By Christ”, to which “Those in Charge” in settlement days took offence, as they were charged with up holding Proper British values. |
| BY THE CROW; | The estimated direct distance ( if the crow flew it) between two places, which may have little relationship to the actual travellable distance. |
| CACKEY HANDER: | Somebody whose natural manual preference resides in their left hand. |
| CACKLEBERRY: | Same as BUM NUT, but without the relationship with BARKER’S EGGS. |
| CAME DOWN IN THE LAST SHOWER: | An expression discrediting a person who is too new to know what has happened in the past. (Great expression in a drought. Shows the reverse humour of our larrikin origins. |
| CANOODLE: | A publicly acceptable mild expression of affection, usually displayed in the younger generations. |
| CANE TOADS: | Not only the much hated amphibians introduced to Australia, but the sound & smell they exude when they are squashed on the road & become WASSA’s, a term used to describe one’s breaking of wind..Farting. |
| CAT’S PYGAMAS: | Same as Bonza. |
| CATCH AS CATCH CAN: | A meal one gets for one’s self with whatever is available, when the cook isn’t going to supply it. |
| CHALK & CHEESE: | The knowing of the metaphoric difference is very important, or one can end up in quite some bother. |
| CHALKIES: | Teachers, usually of Primary and Secondary schools, in the Public system |
| CHARGE LIKE A WOUNDED BULL: | To totally over inflate the price of something beyond a reasonable degree. Also called DAYLIGHT ROBBERY. |
| CHEESE & KISSES: | The Missus (wife) |
| CHINA PLATE: | Ya best Mate….could even be ya Cheese & Kisses! |
| CHOCK-A-BLOCK: | Full! Cannot handle any more. This comes from the nautical expression “Choke a Block” where two Blocks (pullies) have been drawn together, and there is no more room for them to move. |
| CHOCKERS: | To be very full. See CHOCK-A-BLOCK. |
| CHOOK: | The most often used word when referring to poultry. |
| CHOPPEY FOR CHANGEY: | Fair exchange, no robbery, and all equal in the end. QUITS. |
| CHUFFED: | To become pleased, excitedly happy, glad. |
| CHUNDER: | To vomit. This term is used for vomiting usually as a result of a Bender or a Blinder. It has many other variations, depending upon one’s dialect of one’s Local,(q.v.) |
| CLANGER: | The gaffe one makes, specially in front of their superiors. Clangers are dropped, as in” …..dropped a Clanger”. |
| CLAP YA LAUGHING GEAR AROUND THAT: | An expression meaning to get stuck into the food or drink which has just been offered you, without delay. Another inference of “TWO FOUR SIX EIGHT, DBOG IN, DON’T WAIT”. |
| CLAPPED OUT: | Most often used in reference to motor vehicles which are very near to, or actually at the end of their useful life. It can also be applied to other inanimate objects, and even a person who feels absolutely exhausted. |
| CLAYTONS: | From the trade name of a non alcoholic drink. It is the drink you have, when you are not having a drink, et al. A substitute. |
| CLEVER BREECHES: | Same as SMARTY PANTS. A person who gets it right, or fixes a situation when others fail, but is very COCKY about it. |
| CLOBBER: | Firstly, to Clobber somebody or thing is to hit it with substantial force. This can be either really or metaphorically. Secondly, Clobber refers to the clothing you are wearing, or about to select to be suitable for the occasion. |
| CLOD HOPPERS: | Heavy duty work boots worn by those on The Land, to protect their feet in hard earthed ploughed paddocks, but also now used to describe any hefty footwear. |
| CLOSE SHAVE: | A near miss…..a potential danger from which you have escaped by a Gnat’s Whisker. |
| CLOTHERED EARED: | A person who selects to not hear what they are being told, and will apply their own already resolved solution to the question they may have asked. |
| COBBER: | A Mate, friend, pal, or somebody you’ve just met, but have not yet established a proper relationship, yet there is no ill-will. |
| COBBER: | A friend, or Mate, or a respectful address to someone you have only recently met. |
| COCK: | Of similar usage as MATE. This term seems to have been relegated to the more remote areas of Oz, and is rarely heard in urban areas to-day. |
| COCKATOO: | Although being a bird, it is also the term used for the lookout of a gang engaged in a covert venture. It comes from the habit of one cockatoo (bird) perching on the highest position available, as lookout, whilst the rest of the gang raid the farmers crops. |
| COCKEY’S JOY: | A thick and very sweet syrup, which I remember coming in a tin of about 1lb (500Ml), which was put into everything to sweeten it, or disguise the nasty taste to make the food/drink/medicine, more palatable. It was viewed in its early days as a treat for the COCKEY, ( not the bird), but the owner or manager of a station or property. It was very common in the kitchens of the post WW11 years in which I was a youngster. |
| COCK-UP: | A mistake, error, wrong-going, a complete farce, disaster, depending on the importance of the COCK-UP. |
| COCKY (BOSS): | The owner or manager of a property or station, usually of some substance. |
| COCKY (PROUD): | That attitude presented by a person who thinks they are above those in their company. This was a very frowned upon attitude, specially by those who did “ the common work” which kept everything running. |
| COD’S WALLOP: | A reply to a non believable statement, a gentile manner of suggesting the statement is BULLSHIT. Probably from Cockney, et al, being the waste from a fish mongers trade. (Rare these days) |
| CODGER/COVE: | A perhaps slightly denigrating referral to a man, as in, “What a silly old cove”. Rarely heard these days. |
| COLIWOBBLES: | An uncomfortable feeling in your stomach, perhaps related to mild colic, but which causes you to remain in a handy distance of a toilet. |
| COME BACK: | The assumed right to have retribution in the event of a COCK-UP. |
| CONKED OUT: | Exhausted. Dead. Ceased functioning. |
| COO-EE: | A vocal expression used to gain the attention of one or more people whose whereabouts maybe unknown. It is made in a very loud voice, with hands cupped around the mouth to concentrate the sound in the desired direction. The COO part is usually quite long, with the EE part being quite short, and at a high pitch. It seems to be peculiarly Antipodean. |
| COSSIES: | Costume, specially as in swimming attire, but is used in different regions of Australia to encompass general clothing. See TOGS |
| CREEP/CREEPY: | Not to make one’s way in a sneaky fashion, but to describe a person of displaying a very suspect manner, and be very suspicious about their real intent. |
| CROOK: | When one is not one’s self through “ill Health”. This is a common result of a BENDER or if you’re “real CROOK” or a BLINDER. Licence is given in some states for a period of recovery, then after that, you’re on ya PAT MALONE. |
| DACKS: | Trousers, pants. Underpants are UNDER DACKS |
| DAD & DAVE: | A shave. |
| DAG: | The term strictly refers to the accumulation of faeces about a sheep’s anus & tail. This mass (mess) if not removed, can cause fly-strike, and bring an animal down.When applied to the human, it means one who is not necessarily conforming to their peer’s regard. Emphasis of the word will determine the extent of the value of its application. |
| DAMPER: | A party pooper, somebody who unreasonably wants to take the enjoyment out of a social affair. It is also the mixture of flour, water, sugar, and a little salt, cooked in a camp oven or in the embers of the camp fire, to become bread. It was the staple diet of SUNDOWNERS and SWAGGIES, and the great majority of families during the Depression. |
| DAPTO DOGS: | Dapto is a town S.W of Wollongong where there is a strong greyhound racing fraternity. If one has gone to the Dapto Dogs, one is really doing it tough. |
| DARBY AND JOAN: | A reference to a middle aged couple whose children have left home, and are enjoying the solitude of their live as they approach their senior years. |
| DATE: | That area of your anatomy which is sat upon, and never sees the sun. It is derived from a bawdy song about the leopard having 365 spots, one for every day on the year. But what about Leap Years? Lift up its tail and there is the 29th of February. |
| DEAD RINGER: | An exact copy. (Not a campanologist who has fallen from the tower.) |
| DIDDLED: | Conned, taken down, swindled, cheated, DUDDED, etc. |
| DIE HARD: | A person who perseveres beyond reason. |
| DIGGER: | Not so commonly used to-day because of the generation gap, but Aussie soldiers are still very proud to be known as “diggers” as that is where the ANZAC i.e. was borne. The ANZAC troops had to “Dig in” for their own safety. This was continued into the European theatre of WW I, and also applied in WW II, hence the term. |
| DILLY BAG; | A carry-all of no particular design or size, but of great value to its owner. |
| DINKIE DI: | REAL. If it “ain’t Dinki Di”, it ain’t true! |
| DIVVIE UP: | To divide/apportion something amongst a number of persons, usually unequally, according to their deserve. |
| DOB,DOB-IN: | See DOBBING. |
| DOBBER: | The doer of the DOBBING, and held in low regard. |
| DOBBING: | To DOB on somebody is considered a very lowly act, as they are being reported to a higher authority, when mostly the report is unnecessary, and the DOBBER is most interested in their own innocence in the matter. |
| DODGEY: | Not to be trusted, relied upon, or taken at face value, but not necessarily of malice or dangerous intent. |
| DOG’S BREAKFAST: | A canine delight, which when eaten with gusto becomes strewn all about, creating an awful mess. |
| DOG’S EYE; | Slang for a meat pie. If the pie is known to be not of the better standard, it is commonly referred to as such. |
| DON’T BUST YA BOILER: | Don’t work so hard as to damage yourself. This is usually applied to one who has a compulsion to get the job done a.s.a.p. |
| DON’T BUST YA BOILER: | Same as DON’T BUST YO GUT. |
| DON’T BUST YA GUT: | Don’t work so hard as to damage yourself. Slow down, and wait for assistance. |
| DON’T GET OFF YA BIKE: | Simmer down, count to ten, and relax. Usually applied to a person who is becoming STROPPY. |
| DON’T STIR THE POSSUM: | Leave well enough alone! Don’t create a worse situation. |
| DONNEYBROOK: | A fight, but not as serious as a STOUSH. |
| DOUBLE DUTCH: | An oxymoron, or other phrase which makes no sense. |
| DOUGH: (MONEY) | That which we never seem to have enough of to achieve our desires. |
| DRONGO: | A silly person. One of intelligence deficit. |
| DROP LIKE FLIES: | People or animals who from shear exhaustion collapse, usually applied to a group situation. |
| DUCKS ON THE BOARDS: | A shearer’s term to alert the shed that there is a woman in their midst. |
| DUDDED: | Taken down, conned, duped, swindled. |
| DUMMY SPIT: | This is a lovely term to describe the actions of a person who is being very verbose in an irate manner, just as an infant spits their dummy when displeased. |
| DUNGAREES: | Denim trousers used by those in heavy work, specially as sailors wore in their daily duties in the days of sail. It may have applied to other areas of industry too. To-day’s equivalent is jeans. |
| DUNNY: | The second-most important structure of one’s abode. Your kitchen feeds your primary need, food, and the DUNNY takes care of the other end of the natural process of life. In my younger days the DUNNY was set apart from the house, but is now an integral part of domestic architecture. In some remote parts, the DUNNY is also known as the LONG DROP, as it was constructed so, as to not to have to be attended to, too frequently. |
| DUST DEVILS | Clockwise swirlings of dust in open areas like paddocks and plains. It is nearly vertical, and travels quite quickly across the ground. Usually seen on hot days. |
| EARBASHING: | That which ya get from the Missus if you have one more beer than she thinks fit, or the Boss at work as a reprimand. | |
| EATING (or DININING) WITH THE MINERS (or MINORS): | A very old tradition of coal miners was to have their evening meal quite soon after they got home from the day shift, or before they started twilight shift. This expression is not much heard nowadays, but can also be linked to the patriarch dining early in the evening, with the MINORS. It can also be expressed as “EATING WITH THE FLIES”. Flies in Oz usually retreat at about dusk or soon after. | |
| FAIR DINKUM: | The honest truth. It can be used as a statement of validity or rhetorical question. | |
| FAIR GO: | That which every Aussie (& Kiwi) wants to have in their life. It is perceived as being something which everybody else, including government, should bestow on all individuals, specially ME. | |
| FAIR SUCK OF THE SAV: | Usually an expression of perceived unfairness in a situation between two or more people. | |
| FAT AS MUD: | Obese. | |
| FAT CHANCE: | Opposite to FAT AS MUD…. The least (leanest) chance of all of achieving a desired outcome. | |
| FIT AS A FIDDLE: | Meaning one is in a state of very good health. | |
| FIT AS A MALLEE BULL: | To be in extremely good condition. For a bull to survive the summer in The MALLEE, a Nor’western area of Victoria, he had to be tough and resilient. | |
| FLASH IN THE PAN: | A monetary spark of brilliance. A glimpse of the obvious. A sudden inspirational idea. These meanings are derived from that FLASH IN THE PAN, which meant that the gold fossicker, when panning, has a flash of gold in his pan. | |
| FLAT AS A PANCAKE: | A term to describe the flatness of something, usually related to one’s environment, being it the land, waterway, or sea which surrounds them. | |
| FLAT OUT LIKE A LIZARD DRINKING: | This means that a person is very busy, or in a big hurry. It comes from the fact that certain lizards become very engrossed in their morning duty to flatten themselves upon the night’s dew, and “Drink” moisture into their body via pores under their abdomen. | |
| FLAT STRAP/ FLAT CHAT: | One is going as fast as they can. | |
| FLEA BAG: | Can be said of horses, but usually refers to a degraded dog, or sometimes a cat,. Scrawny, mangy, and full of fleas. | |
| FLIP: | A person who displays the attributes of being stupid, or against the current trend. | |
| FLOOZIE: | A woman of questionable moral status, often dressed and tarted up to make mutton look like lamb. | |
| FLY OFF THE HANDLE: | The vocal reaction one has when confronted by an adverse situation. | |
| FLY ON THE WALL: | Position one wishes to be in to observe the antics of others, and not be detected. | |
| FLY PAPER FOR STICKIE BEAKS: | An expression used to ridicule a stupid question, or to put another person in their place. | |
| FOUR SLICES SHORT OF A LOAF: | Mentally challenged. (similarly, “4 snags short of a barbecue”) | |
| FREMANTLE DOCTOR: | The strong Sou’westerly wind which comes in from the Indian Ocean in the late afternoon and relieves the heat of the day in and around Fremantle, and the land areas from Bunbury to north of Perth. | |
| FROG HOLLOW: | That place where the sun rarely shines on the natural environment and is usually cold & damp. Often said about the low & shady part of a housing subdivision | |
| FULL AS A TICK: | The result of being on a BENDER or BLINDER, as ticks become so full from their imbibing from their host that they can no longer control themselves, and fall. | |
| GABO MAIL; | A maritime expression for giving unwanted crew members the required 24 hrs Notice of Discharge. The general steaming time from Gabo Is., on the N.S.W. / Victorian border, to Sydney was about 24 hrs. | |
| GALLAH: | A seemingly stupid or dull person who behaves in the manner as the bird of the same name. | |
| GALLOWS HUMOR: | A humorous retort, when the inevitable is about to happen anyway. It is usually wry, sarcastic, and defiant. Typical of the irony which has become a solid part of the Antipodean psyche. | |
| GARBO: | There used to be a driver and two or three loaders to keep the neighbourhood clean of domestic rubbish. Now this is done by one man and a smart truck, but it still takes the GARBO to drive the truck. | |
| GAS BAG: | A person who has a lot to talk about, but who actually says nothing of any consequence. A Blow Hard. | |
| GAZZUNDA: | A porcelain or enamelled receptacle for relieving one’s need during the night. So called, as they GAZZUNDA the bed. They are very rare these days as bedrooms, bathrooms, and toilets are grouped together in the same part of the house. | |
| GET A WRIGGLE ON: | Stir your bones, get a move on, stop being lazy, smarten yourself up, attend to the duty at hand. | |
| GET OFF MY BACK: | Leave me alone. Don’t bother me. | |
| GET ON YA GOAT: | Something which is particularly annoying is said to do this. | |
| GET THE FLICK: | To be dismissed ,sacked, made redundant, not needed or wanted anymore. | |
| GET YA FINGER OUT: | Same as “get a wriggle on”. | |
| GIBBERS: | Any stone, from the size of an orange to as large as a house. The true use of GIBBERS is in the knowledge of its application. | |
| GIVE IT A BURL; | Be a bit game. Give whatever the objective is a good try. | |
| GNAT’S WHISKER: | Gnats, which seem to flock in hundreds at head height in summer, and get up ya nose and in ya mouth, must have very tiny whiskers, hence the relationship to their size for evading a situation. | |
| GO BUNG: | To KARK IT, or fail to function as desired. To die. | |
| GO DOTTY/DOTTIE: | A display of emotion which represents a very caring attitude toward a person, household pet , flora, fauna, or other focus in one’s attention. | |
| GO JUMP IN THE LAKE: | A gentle but firm expression indicating that person to whom this is directed ought take stock of their situation. | |
| GO RIDE YA BIKE: | This can be taken as a directive for the recipient to leave the scene, and consider their position. | |
| GOB SMACKED: | When a person uses this expression about themselves they are suffering total disbelief of a situation. | |
| GOB: | Mouth, lips and teeth. | |
| GONE TO THE DOGS: | Being really down on one’s luck. Too many BLINDERS or BENDERS can bring one to this situation. A serious lack of self esteem and personal care. One in a situation where one might bet on greyhound races to try to recoup one’s losses. | |
| GONE TROPPO: | Said of people who lose the plot due to too much exposure to hot and humid conditions, and or a consumption of alcohol, so that they can’t control their emotions. | |
| GONNER: | A person or thing of the past, or a person (who because of their actions) will soon one. | |
| GOOLIES: | Usually in reference to stones of a hand throwing size, but also applied to the contents of a scrotum. | |
| GOOSE: | A fool, or one of lesser mental capacity than their immediate peers, or one behaving so. | |
| GOOSED: | One is GOOSED when one has been touched on the serious part of one’s posterior. | |
| GRAPE VINE; | That method by which news and/or scandal travels about the community, without seeming to have any physical being. | |
| GRUB: | As in Tucker, or food, but usually regarded as of a lesser quality than Tucker. | |
| GUN SHEARER: | The best and fastest shearer on the boards (of the shearing shed). | |
| GUNNA: | The verbal declaration of one’s intent do something. Often GUNNA is all that happens, and some people are known by this word as their nickname. |
| HAIR OF THE DOG: | It is sometimes thought by those who have been on a BENDER or BLINDER that they feel so CROOK because they have been bitten by a dog. To redress this feeling, if they consume a Hair of The Dog which bit them, they will soon recover. Hence a RIP TOP PIE for breakfast. |
| HAYMAKER; | A well placed and powerful punch which usually brings an opponent down. Can also be known as a KING HIT. |
| HEAD LIKE AN UNMADE BED: | Bloody ugly! Very untidy in one’s appearance regards all above the chin. |
| HECKLE: | To not too seriously verbally harass somebody, usually a SPROOKER. |
| HERE’S MUD IN YA EYE: | A toast or salute, of the best nature, to the deserving person. (Often our sayings and phrases mean the opposite of the words actually used, hence this lexicon). It also means that I hope ya chooks die. |
| HIP POCKET IN A SINGLET: | A very apt description of some thing which, or person who, is totally useless. |
| HIS NIBS: | A reference to the unnamed person about whom people are having opinions, or discussion. |
| HIT THE ROOF: | To fly into a rage. To behave in an outlandish & boisterous manner through displeasure. |
| HODGE PODGE: | A mixture of ill-fitting components. A step before chaos. |
| HOT TONGUE & COLD SHOULDER: | The attitude presented by the good lady of the house when the bread winner comes home later than reasonably expected, and likely a little tipsy. |
| HOODWINKED: | Conned, DUDDED, duped, betrayed, but not to a too serious degree. |
| HOORAY: | An exclamation of joy and elation (like when your team wins). |
| HOOROO: | Usually the last word said by two parting people. Same intent as “Farewell”, but it has a more serious yet seemingly casual intent. |
| HOP IT: | Go away, get out of here, leave now. |
| HOPE YA CHOOKS DIE: | Cheers. |
| HOP-TO: | Same as GET A WRIGGLE ON. Action required Now. |
| HUMDINGER: | Absolutely suitable. However, in the days before flushing toilets a humdinger was the name given to the Night Cart which came to collect toilet cans. Hum, as in very smelly, and Dinger as in the bell they rang to announce their presence. |
| HUMPING YA BLUEY: | In its proper form, means to be toting your swag, on the trek of a WALKABOUT. It has nothing to do with a relationship with a person called BLUEY. |
| HUNKY DORY: | Another term to describe the proposed or actual situation as being Very O.K. |
| IN ON THE GROUTER: | When one gets this, they have been fortunate enough to be let in to the as yet undisclosed outcome, which they can use to their advantage. A bottom line entry to a situation. |
| JACKAROO: | A male person who is usually young, tough, and has very good sense of horse and cattle station life requirements. They have to have a goodly ability to be independent, yet meet their station’s needs. |
| JANDLE: | Locally, a Thong which is the preferred very flimsy footwear of the beach goers and casual dressers, but known in the Rickety Isles as such. |
| JIBBERISH: | Any amount of verbal outpourings which make no sense. |
| JILLAROO; | See JACKAROO, but change the gender. |
| JUMBUCK: | A small sheep, somewhere between a lamb and a ewe, much favoured as a meat source, specially if ya ON THE WALLABY. |
| JUST LIKE A BOUGHT ONE: | An expression of appreciation, which declares that the home made article is Bloody BONZA. |
| KACK YA DACKS: | To foul one’s trousers, from some overwhelming event, when one may momentarily lose bodily control. |
| KANGAROO LOOSE IN THE TOP PADDOCK: | To have one of these is to be mentally challenged. Not the full quid, 2 snags short of a barbecue. |
| KARK IT: | Nothing to do with an automobile accessory. It means to die, as cars, computers, pets, and people et al do. |
| KEROSENE CANARY: | A large passenger aeroplane. |
| KIP: | Firstly, a short sleep, or nap, and 2ndly, the little board upon which the pennies are placed when playing TWO UP |
| KNEE HEIGHT TO A GRASSHOPPER: | Not very tall, in fact quite small. |
| KNEES-UP: | A social event, usually a dance night. A well used regional term, but not so much used in the city, except maybe the outer suburbs. |
| KNUCKLE SANDWICH: | That which you get when you receive a BUNCH OF FIVES. A full fist into your mouth. |
| LEMON HEAD: | Used to describe the young surfers who wish to look like experienced surfers (whose hair is often naturally bleached by surfing) by applying lemon juice to their hair. |
| LET HER RIP: | “Looks like everything’s O.K. so let’s get started” |
| LICORACE LEGS: | When the girls from my primary school went to High School they had to wear black stockings, hence………. And I believe this to be so from many reports throughout out Oz.l |
| LINGO: | The language or dialect which is peculiar that locale, area, or region. |
| LOCAL: | The generic term for one’s regular pub, a person who has been a resident of a district for some qualifying years (period set by the Locals). |
| LOLLY LEGS: | Pretty much the same as LICORICE LEGS. Aha, but don’t both these expressions say that there was some normal gender interest in the days of our youth in junior High School? |
| LONG HAIRED BED WARMER: | What a BLOKE may refer to his missus or girlfriend as. |
| LONG HAIRED MATE: | As above |
| LOSE or DO YA BLOCK: | See BLOW YER STACK and GONE TROPPO. |
| MALAHKI, MALARKEY: | A respectful way of exclaiming BULLSHIT. That which has just been said ought not be believed. |
| MATE: | This is a word of great endearment to/for a person of similar ilk, or it can be used as a totally derogatory denunciation of a person. To recognise its implication in the circumstances used, one must know the context in which it used. It is a particularly strongly Australian expression, and should not be taken lightly or used flippantly by others. |
| MAY ALL YA CHOOKS GROW UP TO BE EMUS, AND KICK YA DUNNY DOOR DOWN: | In its apparent simplicity, this is a great insult and derogatory statement which declares the abortion of the sayer to the recipient. It examples the typical depth and Sinicism of our Antipodean heritage. |
| MENDING FENCES: | Atonement. Swallowing ones’ pride and getting on with life. Tis similar to Humble Pie…..May catch in your craw at first, but becomes easier to swallow with time and experience. |
| MISHMASH: | A Hodge Podge. An untidy collection or accumulation. |
| MIXED BAG: | An amount of loosely associated items. |
| MOB: | A group or gathering of people, or members of one’s family, including all The Reloes. It is similarly applied to animals such as horses, cows, sheep etc. It is rarely used in an aggressive manner. A group of undefined identities. |
| MONTH O’ SUNDAYS: | A bloody long time. (Usually related to a period of waiting.) |
| MOTHER PIN A ROSE ON ME, I’VE CLICKED AGAIN: | This is a very rarely heard expression these days. It means that the person saying it has had a substantial win or achievement against great odds. |
| MOTZA: | Used to describe something of great cost or value. |
| MOUTH LIKE THE FLOOR OF A BUDGIE’S CAGE: | How life tastes the morning after a BENDER. |
| MOZZIE’S COSSIES: | Same as Ant’s Pants, Bonza, & Cat’s Pyjamas, et al. |
| NEVER NEVER: | That place which is beyond THE BLACK STUMP, somewhere out in the middle of Australia. |
| NEVER NEVER: | The time payment system which means you’ll be paying for something for a very long time. |
| NINKUMPOOP: | One who is mentally challenged. |
| NIX: | For nothing, free, at no cost, e.g., “You can have it for NIX”. |
| NO FLIES ON ME: | Refers to someone who is so smart or clean-skinned that they are above the norm, and don’t attract flies. This saying is often extended to………..”But you can see where they have been”. |
| NOBBLED: | To be influenced in an underhand manner to not perform one’s duties in a normal & proper manner. Applies mainly to horses, dogs, and people. |
| NONG: | An idiot…could even be a DIEHARD. |
| NOT BAD: | Once again, the Antipodean logic: It means a thing is considered good, pretty good, or even very good. BONZA. |
| NOT ON YA NELLIE: | Meaning that there is no chance of what one person wishes will happen to another. |
| NULLA NULLA: | Same as a WADDI ( not the dried-up creek bed), but an instrument used to crack another’s skull, or cause severe damage to another person. It is usually of about a fore-arm’s length, with a root lump at the working end. |
| OCKER: | OCKER seems to be that unnamed, undefined person with whom everybody has a quite close relationship. Could be compared with the BUNYIP…..everybody knows all about bunyips, yet they are scientifically indescribable. Tis a feeling more than a fact, but if ya ain’t OCKER, ya ain’t DINKUM! |
| OFFSIDER: | With the great panache we have for the four codes of “football” it seems again that Antipodean logic prevails. In the codes, being Offside is a very naughty place to be, and can cause a team a loss. However, to be one’s OFFSIDER outside the football codes is a point of appreciation and respect. As his OFFSIDER you are the best person to assist the tradesman with his tasks. |
| OLD AS METHUSELA: | Tis a long time ago when I first heard this expression, but the expression itself explains itself….a very long time ago, or of more than reasonable considerable age. |
| OLD BAG: | Not a nice term, and usually used in reference to and elderly woman, particularly of the type who is lonely and a bit sour, and should be more pitied than scorned. To extend this, “hag” is the word (used derogatorily now) for the wise old women who maintained the knowledge of herbs & healing for their community a couple of centuries ago |
| OLD BASTARD: | In the colloquial Australian idiom, this is generally used as a term of endearment or comradeship. It is often used as an unemotional emotional greeting between two old mates who have had little contact or not seen each other for quite some time. Beware! Do be frugal and knowing before you use this greeting. It has special and personal implications. |
| OLD DOG FOR A HARD ROAD: | A term to describe experience (which comes with age) being superior to youth in a difficult situation. |
| ON TH’ WALLABY: | The full term is, “On th’ wallaby track”, meaning you are travelling the country at your leisure for your pleasure. |
| ON THE BUGLE: | Very smelly, rotten, stinking, putrid. |
| ON THE OUTER: | Not at all welcome, very unpopular. |
| ON THE THRONE: | Seated on the toilet. |
| ON THE TOE: | To take it On The Toe is to very quickly remove one’s self from the scene. |
| OUTBACK: | That place which is somewhere between The Black Stump and the Never Never. |
| OVERDRAFT ALLEY: | That area of a city where the rich & famous live. |
| PADDY WAGON: | The police vehicle into which one could be bundled for transport to the local lock-up. Could be derived from Paddy’s Waggon, as early convicts were of mainly Irish stock. |
| PARSON’S NOSE: | The last part over the fence, or better known as the tail of a cooked chook. |
| PAT MALONE: | On your own, all alone, solo. |
| PEGGY: | A term from our nautical heritage, and the Royal Navy. It is derived from the practice of employing leg amputees on sailing ships (who could no longer climb the rigging) and who were fitted with a Peg Leg, to attend to the domestic requirements of their vessel. |
| PICCANINNI: | Truly, an aboriginal baby or infant, but often used to describe something small. |
| PICKING WILD FLOWERS: | A rather quaint term (rarely heard these days) meaning one has interrupted their journey to attend to a personal relief a little way off the roadside. Motorways and Freeways seem to have negated this necessity. |
| PILE UP: | Not used to describe putting of one thing upon another, but a multiple vehicle road accident, |
| PISS HOLES IN THE SNOW: | A description of what your eyes and face might look like the morning after a BLINDER. |
| PITT STREET FARMER: | A not so common term nowadays, but still has application to those who live in the city, and own farms UP THE SCRUB, which they rarely visited. Can also be attached to the practice of tax evasion. |
| PLASTERED: | What you are as a result of being on a BENDER or a BLINDER. |
| POINT THE BONE: | An indigenous practice of a tribal elder pointing a sacred bone at a person to cast a spell or curse upon that person. It was taken so seriously that it sometimes resulted in sickness or death of pointee. It has the same inference in white society, but without sickness & death. |
| PRANG: | A collision between a motor vehicle and something else, e.g. another vehicle, a lamp post, tree, wombat or ‘roo, or even ya front fence. |
| PRONTO: | Instantly! Very quickly! Now! |
| PULL YA LEG: | Just kidding, not serious, in a jocular fashion. |
| QUIDS: | A still used term to describe an amount of money, like “I wouldn’t be dead for quids”. Quids being the slang for pounds (sterling). |
| QUITS: | Evens, not in anyone’s favour. |
| RANTAN: | To rant & rage, or create a commotion about a particular thing. |
| RAT UP A RAFTER: | The speed with which a person vacates a scene when the pressure is on. |
| RAT’S ARSE: | Of very little worth. |
| RATBAG: | A person of little intellectual ability. |
| RATBAGS: | A group of people of the same ideals which are considered by others to be worthless and/or stupid. |
| RATTLE TRAP: | A clapped out old vehicle in a great state of disrepair, but managing to still provide limited transport. |
| RAZZ: | To derogatorily criticise an idea, statement, or action. |
| RED RATTLER: | The now old fashioned maroon coloured railway carriages, used mostly on Sydney suburban services but also sent to regional areas of N.S.W. to make them invisible to Sydneysiders. |
| RELLOES: | The kith & kin. Those whom you cannot choose, but can also be your friends. |
| RIDGIE DIDGE(IE): | True! The absolute truth! TRUE BLUE!. |
| RING IN: | An imposter, or stand-in for a person or thing. A substitute of little equal to the real thing. |
| RINGER: | The best shearer on the boards of the shearing shed. A Gun Shearer. It has crossed from the original application to embrace the larger meaning of anything which is Pretty Good, or NOT BAD. |
| RIP TOP PIE: | A term to describe a worker’s lunch, which consists of the ring-pulled can of beer. |
| ROLLIES: | Hand rolled cigarettes, also called The Makings. |
| ROUGH AS GUTS: | Quite unrefined, but not necessarily meant in a derogatory manner. One can be Rough As Guts, and still be very much appreciated. |
| RUBITTY DUB: | The tub, or bath, or to take a bath, as in, I’m off for a RUBBITTY DUB. |
| RUMMEN: | A term I’ve found used regularly in Tasmania, and about the waterfront of Port Adelaide amongst the (now defuncked) S.A./Tassie ketch fleet. It appears to be a derivative of “A Rum One”, meaning a person is a bit on the lively or mischievous side. A nice term, really, used with affection. |
| RUNNING A BANKER: | This has nothing to do with finance and interest rates. When a river or creek (don’t seem to have many streams in Australia) Runs A Banker it is full & fast, as the result of rains upstream. |
| RUST BUCKET: | A CLAPPED OUT vehicle, usually a car, full of rust and worthless, except for being a place for chooks to roost |
| SCAB: | Not the healing hard patch on a wound, but a person who defies, or goes against, the decision of a union to conduct a particular campaign. A union member who works when the rest of the union is on strike. |
| SCAPA: | To go. A mainly WW ll naval term, referring to Scapa Flow, in the Orkney Islands north of Scotland, where convoys for Murmansk (Russia) were assembled. Sort of like, ”If you’re bound for Scapa Flow, then to Murmansk you will go”. This phrase is not much heard ashore, but with Oz being an island, and our participation in WW ll, there is a place for it in our history. |
| SCHOONER RIGGED: | Having only the minimum requirements, like a person with only one set of CLOBBER. It comes from the nautical term meaning a Schooner was Fore & Aft rigged, and had very much less sail area than Full Rigged Ships, with many square sails.. |
| SCRUB: | That place somewhere in land, but not necessarily too far away from the coast, where the natural flora is somewhat stunted and rough, not at all like the natural floras of Northern Hemisphere countries. It is also the definitive word to describe some of the natural flora. |
| SCUTTLEBUTT; | Talk and yarns swapped by sailors at the BUTT, which was the broad based narrow topped “keg” from which their “meal” was served in the days of sail. This serving was usually in the evening, tween watches, which was the only time when the two watches could have some sociable repartee. When the “meal” in the butt became low, and had to be “scuttled for” the sailors had to wait, hence the time for the exchanging more “news” between watches, whilst the Butt was being Scuttled. |
| SEND HER DOWN HUEY: | The inland dweller’s plea to the skies for some decent heavy rain, usually made as the clouds muster, or the first drops fall. |
| SEPTIC TANKS: | Yanks. Although the servicemen of the U.S.A. were a great help in defending the opportunity for me to be able to gather this lexicon, I am totally against the desires of their descendants to take over the commercial, natural, linguistic, and antipodean inheritance of my nation and New Zlnd just as they would in me doing it to them, hence the term. (Full Of Shit) |
| SHAG ON A ROCK: | Being in a lonely place. Shags (sometimes called cormorants) choose an isolated rock to spend a couple of hours drying their feathers after a feeding period diving to catch their TUCKER. |
| SHAGGY DOG: | This is not canine related, except by name. It refers to the value of truth and/or depth of humour encompassing a yarn which is usually long-winded and very plausible, until the punch line. |
| SHAKE A LEG: | To get out of bed, GET A WRIGGLE ON, become active, PRONTO!. |
| SHANDY: | A mixture of about 50/50 of beer and lemonade. A rather nice drink in summer, and with the alcohol reduction can still allow one to drive within legal blood-alcohol allowances. |
| SHANK’S PONY: | If you are walking from one place to another you are going by Shank’s Pony. |
| SHARP AS A TACK: | Very quick witted, analytical, astute. |
| SHICKERED: | Somewhere between “just nicely” and PLASTERED. |
| SHIELA: | The female partner of a BLOKE. An unnamed female person. However, it is a very proper female Christian name, likely from Ireland. |
| SHINDIG: | A social event, usually with much dancing, the quality of which may deteriorate throughout the night, specially if one has consumed too many RIP TOP PIES. |
| SHINER: | A Black Eye, or more properly, the blood-evident bruising of a blow to the optical region, occasioned by sporting contact, or being involved in a STOUSH. |
| SHINY AS A NEW PIN: | Bright and sparkling. In very good condition. |
| SHIRKER: | The opposite of a DIEHARD. One who avoids effort. See BLUDGER. |
| SHIRTY: | Agitated, up-tight, mildly aggressive. |
| SHONKEY: | Very suspect, opposite to FAIR DINKUM. |
| SHOOT THROUGH: | (Like a Bondi Tram). To leave, go away, absent one’s self at great speed. |
| SHOUT: | To pay for, on someone else’s behalf. |
| SHOVE OFF: | A very proper nautical expression of good seamanship, meaning that the oarsmen on the side of the ship’s boat not alongside a ship or wharf were to use the looms (handles) of their oars to push the boat sideways away from the ship/wharf so that the “inner sided” oarsmen could lower their oars and give the boat headway together with the “clear sided” oarsmen. Tis unfortunate that to-days use of this phrase has been corrupted into an aggressive form. |
| SIDEKICK: | Helper, assistant, apprentice, aid. |
| SITTING ON THE FENCE: | To not make a decision, one way or the other, hoping the situation will disappear, or someone else will decide for you. |
| SKINT: | Broke, penniless, destitute. |
| SKITCH: | The word used to set a dog (or another person) onto an objective. |
| SKITE: (noun & verb) | To be a show-off….a boaster. |
| SKITTLED: | To be knocked over (but not too badly damaged) on a road, or a footpath by a bike, skateboard, or car. |
| SKUN: | To have the skin removed, as in a rabbit ready for the oven. (Think about some naked people you have seen in change rooms……Look like a SKUN rabbit??) |
| SLEDGING: | The disparaging remarks said by one player to a targeted player of the other team, most often related to cricket. |
| SLOPE (SLOPEHEAD): | A derogatory term to describe a South East Asian emigrant, specially Vietnamese, or those thought to be Vietnamese. |
| SMARTIE PANTS: | One who thinks they know it all, but who is brought to earth with a resounding crash into reality, either really, or metaphorically. |
| SNAFFLE: | To take, commandeer, but not in a too illegal situation. |
| SNAG(S): | An anagram for Sensitive New Age Guys, or a popular part of the barbecue menu, sausages. (Something Nasty And Gruesome) |
| SNIVLE: | To whine , whinge, and/or complain about a situation, usually of little consequence, but take no action oneself. |
| SNOTTED: | Hit on the nose by a KNUCKLE SANDWICH or BUNCH O’ FIVES. |
| SOAP BOX: | A small portable podium upon which stands a SPROOKER when delivering a discourse on their favourite subject. |
| SOOJEE: | A nautical term to describe a mixture of cleaning agent and water. |
| SOUTHERLY BUSTER: | The strong wind (and sometimes rain) which brings great relief after 3 or 4 days of hot weather in summer. It usually arrives in the evening, and lasts a couple of hours. |
| SPARROW’S FART: | A very early hour of the day to be getting up or starting work. |
| SPEEDO’S: | A quite brief apparel for males to wear when going swimming. This generic name was taken from the brand name, and was the standard attire for male beach and competitive swimmers. It leaves little to the imagination. |
| SPEND A PENNY: | Generally going to the toilet. It came from the cost of one penny to use a public toilet. |
| SPINE BASH: | To have a lie down, a snooze, a ZIZZ, specially in the afternoon after a good morning’s work. |
| SPINE BASHER: | A person who habitually practiced the above. Similar to CANVAS BACK. |
| SPROOK: | To be quite vociferous about one’s ideas. It is often done standing on a SOAP BOX in a public domain in cities. |
| SPUDS: | Potatoes of any description, baked, boiled, mashed, etc. |
| SQUILLIONS: | A great amount, usually relating to money. |
| SQUIZZ: | To look at a thing of interest closely. |
| STAB IN THE DARK: | To have a go at something, with little planning or chance of getting the desired outcome. |
| STALE BOTTLE O’ PISS: | A rather useless object (piss being beer) which people are said to stand around like. |
| STIMIED: | This is a situation where there appears to be no relief. It is a quite popular Golf term, but I have noted it creeping into professional areas too. Seems that our financial guiders find themselves stimied at times, too, or like to tell us so. |
| STINKS LIKE THE DUNNY DOOR ON A PRAWN TRAWLER: | To hear this said would mean that the enveloping odour is extremely ON THE BUGLE. |
| STONE TH’ CROWS: | A exclamation of excitement, surprise, or disgust. |
| STONKERED: | You are Stonkered when you cannot fathom the answer to a problem, or are worn out from trying without success. |
| STOOP & FETCH IT: | Usually the lowest member of a work gang, who gets all the menial tasks, as the phrase says. |
| STOUSH | A fight of fistycuffs, meant to be settled more by threat and sparing than outright physical damage. |
| STRAIN THE SPUDS; | A usually male expression meaning to urinate. This is but one of many LOCAL expressions which imply the same meaning. |
| STRIKE A LIGHT: | Same as STONE THE CROWS. |
| STRINE: | The language wotz spoke in ‘strailya’. |
| STROPPY: | Being upset, but not yet angry. |
| STROPPY; | An elastic expression to describe one’s discomfort of a situation, ranging from moderate displeasure to ire. |
| STRUTH: | An exclamation of surprise or profundity. Its application, as in, ”Struth, here’s Ruth?”, leads one to think its origin may be a compression of, “It’s the truth” or in the query form, “Is it the truth? “. |
| STUBBIES: | Short legged elastic waisted denim or drill shorts which is almost a uniform for those in industrial and building occupations. It also refers to the half sized (375 ml) beer bottle. |
| STUMPED: | As in Stimied, having come against a seemingly immovable object or situation. |
| STUNNED MULLET: | Mullet, a rather dull sort of fish, often live in swamps, and other easily accessible waterways. In these waterways one can easily employ a 1.5 / 2.0 metre length of No. 8 fencing wire to crack or stun the mullet. They then behave in a fashion of stupidity, and be GOB SMACKED, and are easily caught by hand. |
| SUNDOWNER: | A SWAGMAN, so called because they usually arrive at a place to rest at Sundown. |
| SWAG: | The worldly possessions of the Swagman, usually rolled and lashed so as to slung over the shoulder, containing his sleeping needs, and some clothing. A Billy and a panacean may be slung from the swag, with a tucker Bag over the other shoulder. |
| SWAGGIE: | Short for swagman, a person who tramped the bush and outback taking whatever work was available, and often paid in Tucker rather than money. They were great carriers of news, and were associated with the term Bush Telegraph. |
| SWAGGIE’S ALARM CLOCK: | The first sounds of the kookaburra, half an hour before sunrise. This first call is remarkably reliable, and varies as does sunrise throughout the year. |
| SWYE: | The other name for the game of TWO UP. |
| TAB NABS: | Little cakes, biscuits, scones etc, usually offered at Afternoon Tea, in Higher Society. Our Antipodean roots have used this expression as a form of denigration of the Higher society. |
| TAKE THE MICKEY: | To kid, tease, or cajole somebody. |
| TAKE THE PISS: | Same as TAKE THE MICKEY. |
| TARTED-UP: | A person or thing put into a visually cosmetically good condition. |
| TASSIE IN THE SAND: | A female nude sunbaker, laying face down. |
| TECHNICOLOUR YAWN: | To vomit. |
| THE FLICKS: | The cinema, or picture theatre. |
| THE GRAPEVINE: | That method by which information gets from one person or place to another. |
| THE LONG PADDOCK: | Australia has many stock routes for moving cattle and sheep about. Some of these were fenced on the sides, but not the ends. |
| THE MAKINGS: | Tobacco and papers for rolling cigarettes. |
| THE PUNT MUST BE IN: | When I was a lad in the ‘40s and 50’s I lived on the North side of a river. Whenever a stream of cars went through the town we would say, “The punt must be in”, This expression stuck, and is often used to refer to large number of vehicles appearing suddenly. Not much often heard to-day. |
| THICK AS A BRICK: | Same as the following.. |
| THICK AS TWO SHORT PLANKS: | Used to describe a person who is not really mentally challenged, but who says or does stupid things. |
| THIN AS A RAKE: | A person of not much avoirdupois. .(Avoirdupois, meaning Weight, used to be on the back of Exercise Books, in the Comparisons Table. It seems to have been replaced by Mass, to-day.) A person somewhat resembling a “stick insect”, of which we have many,. (The insects, which grow to about 18” or 50 cm, long) are rather nice to enjoy in one’s garden, and upon one’s arm. They are very skinny and fragile, and completely harmless to humans. |
| THONG: | Not a lispy person singing, but an item of footwear, being of a flat sole and two straps which join together between the 1st and 2nd toes. We now have dressed our BLOKE, in a BEANIE, STUBBIES, and THONGS. |
| THREE DOG NIGHT: | A reference to the very low temperature of the night, requiring a third dog on your bed to keep you warm. |
| TICKER: | Your heart. |
| TICKLED PINK: | That state of emotion where one is immediately very happy. |
| TIN TANK: | A Yank. |
| TINNIE (BEER CAN): | A 375 ml. beer can, often used to administer the HAIR OF THE DOG. |
| TINNIE (BOAT): | A very popular aluminium open boat, of about 3 to 4 metres long, powered by an outboard motor, and used for fishing in rivers, lakes, dams, etc. |
| TOASTRACK: | An old fashioned tram with all its rows of seats across the body of the tram accessible from both sides. |
| TOGS: | Generally in reference to swim wear, but is also used to denote any clothing, like CLOBBER. |
| TOMMO’S: | Tommo’s is the legendry illegal TWO UP school which was quite nomadic, but centring about most localities, specially UP THE SCRUB. |
| TOMMY ROT: | An expression of disbelief about what a person has just said. It is usually stressed with disgust. |
| TRAIN SMASH: | A combination of lightly sautéed tomatoes and onions, usually served at breakfast, often with a sloppy poached or fried egg. It really is nice. |
| TRANNIE: | A typically Australian shortened word for a small portable transistor radio. |
| TRAY BIT: | In the days of sterling currency a TRAY BIT was the smallest coin and was three pennies in value. A highly manoeuvrable vehicle is said to be able to stop or turn on a TRAY BIT. (Its diameter was about two thirds that of to-days 5 cent coin.) |
| TRUE BLUE: | Totally Australianly loyal. Honest, and above reproach. |
| TUB: | To bathe, or shower. |
| TUCKER BAG: | A bag for carrying ya Tucker. |
| TUCKER BOX: | A box (usually containing some number of days’ supplies) which was part of a drover’s or coachman’s kit. A smaller version was usual for industrial workers doing their Day, Twilight, and Midnight shifts. |
| TUCKER: | Food, of whatever nature, is Tucker, but generally referred to in a better light, unlike GRUB. |
| TWO BOB WATCH: | A term to describe the silliness or uselessness of a person or article. |
| TWO BOB: | The sterling currency equivalent of to-days 20 cent coin. |
| TWO HOOTS; | Used to describe one’s lack of interest in something…Couldn’t give Two Hoots. |
| TWO PENNETH OF COCKY SHIT: | Not worth even contemplating. Totally worthless. |
| TWO SAMMOES (SARNIES) SHORT OF A PICNIC: | Mentally challenged. (Samos and/or Sarnies being sandwiches). |
| TWO SHAKES OF A DEAD LAMB’S TAIL: | Something to be done, or is about to happen very very soon. |
| TWO UP: | A very popular gambling game using two pennies which are tossed into the air from a KIP, and bets are made on the combinations of the upper sides of the coins when they come to rest on the ground or floor. (See SWYE and TOMMO’S) Until recently it was illegal to play TWO UP, except on ANZAC DAY, as the government could not collect any gaming revenue. |
| TWO, FOUR, SIX, EIGHT, BOG IN, DON’T WAIT: | A sort of coarse expression meaning to not stand on ceremony, and start eating your meal. (Get stuck into ya TUCKER) |
| UNDERDACKS: | Usually said by males in reference to underpants. |
| UNDERGROUND CKICKEN: | Rabbit, often tried to be disguised as chicken, so it could draw a higher price at the butchers, or in a restaurant. |
| UP & DOWN LIKE A FIDDLER’S ELBOW: | A reference to the rapid and repetitive movement of something in a nearly vertical direction. |
| UP THE CREEK: | That place where you wish to not be, specially without a paddle. If you are UP THE CREEK WITHOUT A PADDLE, you are in real bother. (the coarse version is UP SHIT CREEK) |
| UP THE SCRUB: | Somewhere inland, away from the coast, but not as far as the BLACK STUMP. |
| UP YA SELF: | Conceit, vanity, inflated ego, and snobbery. A syndrome often found in WHINGING POMS and TEN POUND POMS. |
| WACK: (WHACK) | A hit, usually not too hard, or an attempt to accomplish something, or the portion expected by a person when something is being divided (DIVVIED UP) amongst a number of people. |
| WADDI: | A dried-up creek bed, sometimes used as a camp site by those beyond the BLACK STUMP or out in the NEVER NEVER. |
| WADDI: | A weapon, about the length of a fore arm, made from the small trunk of scrubby growth, with the root clump giving weight to working end. |
| WAFFLE ON: | To say lots of words, often repetitive, which have little value to those who have to listen. |
| WAGGA BLANKET: | A number of burlap bags sewn together to become a blanket. So named from the Wagga Wagga district of N.S.W. |
| WALKABOUT: | The undisclosed and apparently aimless wanderings of people, generally but not solely, associated with aborigines, when they take leave of the generally accepted pattern of life. |
| WALLY: | A silly or not too smart person. |
| WASSA: (WOZZA): | Unidentifiable road-kill, as in, “It may have been a cat, but it’s a WASSA now”. |
| WAVY NAVY: | A bit of a rare expression these days, referring to the Reservists of the Royal Australian Navy, as their stripes of rank on their uniform jacket sleeves (rat guards) are not straight, but wavy. |
| WHINGING POM: | There are many of these throughout our community, who came to the Antipodes to escape their miserable lot in the U.K. Some are also known as Ten Pound Poms, as that was their fare to Australia in the 50’s & 60’s. The term refers to their never-ending complaints about their lot here, yet they will not return to from whence they came. They are NOT popular or welcome here. |
| WHITE LEGHORNS: | Ladies who play bowls, so called after the type of old CHOOK which has white legs, as do the white stockinged lady bowlers. |
| WIG WAM FOR A GOOSE’S BRIDLE: | This is a pretty good standard answer to the perpetual question from children, “What’s that, Daddy?’. |
| WILLIE WILLIES: | Remember the DUST DEVILS? Well WILLIE WILLIES are a much larger version of the same thing, and can be destructive. Steer Clear! |
| WITCHETTY GRUB: | A sort of little finger sized edible larva of many moths and beetles. It is specially prized by those who live around and beyond the BLACK STUMP, and indigenous city dwellers who can get them from local gardens. |
| WOBBLIES: | A lovely gentle term for the Rugby Union team which has consistently lost in the Trans Tasman series. |
| WONKEY: | Wobbly, not stable, not to be relied upon. Dodgy. |
| WOULDN’T KNOW YOUR ARSE FROM YOUR ELBOW: | Said of a person who doesn’t know what they are talking about. Because of the distance and variety of The Land of Oz, I would not be surprised if some readers thought this of me and this Lexicon. See my “Aim of this Lexicon” at the tail piece. |
| WOULDN’T SHOUT IF A SHARK BIT HIM: | The opposite to SHOUT, |
| YA DON’T NEED T’ HAVE A LONG NECK: | This is a tacit forerunner (to the rest of the expression) which can be found at GOOSE. |
| YAHOO: | This has nothing to do with internet services. See YOBBO. |
| YAKKA: | Work, usually of a manual nature, which is hard and physically demanding. Hence the full phrase, ”Hard YAKKA”. This word, “YAKKA”, has been taken up by a work clothes manufacturer as their brand name, and sells very well. |
| YARN: | Nothing to do with cloth. A YARN can be long or short, real or invented, humorous or sad. It can be told anywhere at any time, but is usually done at the most opportune time for the teller. See SHAGGY DOG |
| YOBBO: | Those who drive up and down my street, and yours, with exaggerated exhaust pipe tones and bass CD thud-thud at very loud volume. Also applies to those of a similar ilk, who in public places, have no regard for other people or property. |
| ZAC: | To-day’s equivalent is a 5 cent coin, and was the value of sixpence in sterling (our previous) currency. It was about ¾” (or 20 mm) diameter. Twas often said that a person could stop or turn their horse or car on a ZAC, implying extremely tight manoeuvrability. |
| ZEDS: | That which one goes off to pile up when having a ZIZZ. |
| ZIZZ: | That relaxing afternoon nap, specially after a long hard morning from rising at SPARROW’S FART, a sumptuous Sunday lunch, or to help with the digestion of Christmas Dinner. |
ONE HUNDRED WORDS AND SAYINGS OF AUSTRALIAN BUSHMEN
| adam’s ale | drinking water | |
| axe handles across | used as a form of measurement | |
| bandicooting | stealing potatoes out of paddock | |
| boil the billy | for a cup of tea | |
| black stump | a mythical place where no one lives | |
| blind stump | a short stump covered by leaves and ferns | |
| do the block | get angry | |
| bloke | a person | |
| bluey | person with red hair | |
| bluey | a fight or “punch-uo” | |
| bonzer | good, excellent | |
| bowyang | string tied below the knees of work trousers | |
| buckley’s chance | to have no chance at all | |
| bugger all | nothing | |
| bush bellows | a bushies hat | |
| bush pickles | worcestishire sauce stirred into plum jam | |
| bush telegraph | maens where local news and happemings occur in the outback | |
| bush telly | a campfire | |
| A BULLOCK TEAM | A TEAM OF FOURTEEN EACH WITH ITS OWN NAME. 2 “Polers”, the heaviest and strongest 2 “Leads of the Pin” 2 “Body Bullocks” 2″Behind the Leaders’ 2 “Leaders” | |
| buster | a fall or tumble | |
| buzzies | creeping native plant with a very sticky seed head | |
| cant dog | chain and hook used for rolling logs in the bush | |
| chock a block | full to overflowing | |
| cockey’s joy | Golden Syrup | |
| cooee | a bush call which carries a long way | |
| corduroy track | logs are laid crossways to stop sinking into soft earth | |
| crib | packed lunch | |
| crook | to feel ill | |
| double dink | to carry a passenger on a bicycle or horse | |
| dinkum | true, real, honest | |
| does on’s block | get angry | |
| down the chute | hopeless, lost | |
| drag the chain | to be slow in any work or contest | |
| drop one’s bundle | to give up | |
| dropper | wooden stake fixed to fence to keep wires apart | |
| ducks dinner | drink of water without anything to eat | |
| dunnie | outside toilet | |
| flannel | woolen flannel shirt, usually grey | |
| flying axe handles | diarrhoea | |
| flying handicap | an attack of diarrhoea | |
| free swingers | same as in widow makers | |
| furphy | rumour or untruth | |
| go to billyo | get lost, go away and don’t come back | |
| goog | egg | |
| grizzleguts | a person who complains all the time | |
| haven’t a skerrick | haven’t any at all | |
| hold your horses | not so fast | |
| horizontal scrub | thin tree grows then drops to a horizontal angle | |
| hump | to carry over the shoulder | |
| iffey | uncertain, unsure | |
| jack and jill sawing | competition with a male and female team | |
| jackie howe | sleeveless shirt named after famous Australian blade shearer | |
| johnny come lately | person new to the area | |
| jumbuck | a sheep | |
| keep your end up | do your share | |
| kick the bucket | to die | |
| kiss my foot | nonsense | |
| mud map | drawn by bushmen on ground to give instructions | |
| piners | persons who fell huon pine for timber | |
| pull one’s leg | a hoax or trick | |
| razoo | a coin of no value | |
| red gold | cedar tree | |
| red steer | a deliberately lit bush fire | |
| rummin’ | a strange, funny, unusual person | |
| shank’s pony | walking, ttravelling on foot | |
| sheila | a young woman or girl | |
| shoe board | 2″thick,10″wide,6’long,used for climbing trees | |
| shoe steel | under log when pulling to avoid snagging | |
| snig chain | used for pulling logs in the bush | |
| tasmanian bluey | woolen outer garment to protect against severe weather | |
| tucker | food | |
| under dog | sawyer who stood under the log in the pit saw | |
| widowmaker | broken limb hanging, could fall and cause fatality | |
| argue the toss | to dispute a decision or an order | |
| back of Bourke | remote back country | |
| backing dog | sheepdock that runs across backs of sheep | |
| barcoo rot | land scurvy | |
| barmaid’s blush | drink of rum and raspberry | |
| basin crop | a crude type of haircut | |
| big smoke | large city or town | |
| bitser | a mongrel animal,anything made of bits and pieces | |
| booze up | a drinking bout | |
| bovine puncher | bullock driver | |
| buckjumper | horse that bucks,one who rides a bucking horse | |
| bump across | to meet up with | |
| burl, give it a | to make an attempt | |
| bush dinner | mutton, damper and tea | |
| bushwhacker | a coountry worker, expesially an axeman | |
| chalk and talk | schoolteacher | |
| chop | woodchopping contest for axemen | |
| clucky | pregnant | |
| Douglas | an axe | |
| Kelly | an axe | |
| fossick | to search for gold, rummage about | |
| game as Ned Kelly | willing to tackle big odds | |
| gun | an expert shearer | |
| the long paddock | the open road | |
| Phar Lap gallop | the fox trot | |
| Rafferty’s Rules | no rules at all | |
| ripsnorter | something particularly good | |
AUSSIE SAYINGS
| I’M HUNGRY “I could eat the crotch out of a dead leper’s undies.” “I could eat the horse and chase the jockey.” “So hungry I’d eat a shit sandwich, only I don’t like bread.” “I could eat the arse out of a rag doll through a cane chair.” “So hungry I could eat the arse out of a low flying duck.” |
| I’M THIRSTY “I’m dry as a dead dingo’s donger.” “I’m drier than a nun’s nasty.” “I’m dry as a fuck with no foreplay.” “I’m as dry as a pommie’s bath mat.” “I’m as dry as a bull’s bum going up a hill backwards.” “I’m drier than an Arab’s fart.” |
| I NEED TO GO FOR A PEE “Gonna drain me dragon.” “My back teeth are floating.” “Need to syphon the python.” “Takin’ the kids to the pool.” “I got to take a snake’s hiss.” “Gotta go have a slash.” “Gonna go water a horse.” “I’m off to drain the main vein.” “Time to splatter the bladder.” “I’m dying for a piss so bad I can taste it.” “Shake hands with the wife’s best friend.” |
| I NEED TO DO A POO “I gotta go give birth to a Kiwi.” “I’m takin’ a stroll to the gravy bowl.” “It was like giving birth to Kim Beasly.” “Off to the bog to leave an offering.” “Time to snap off a grogan.” “Have to hang a brown bear in the porcelain cave.” “I’m gonna strangle a brownie.” “There’s a brown dog barking at the back door.” “I’m going to give birth to your twin.” “Need to choke a brown dog.” “I’ve freed Nelson Mandela.” “Going for a Rodney.” “Taking out the garbage.” “I gotta back one out.” “Release the Chocolate hostage.” “i gotta lay some cables for Telstra.” |
| VOMIT “Calling for George.” “I was driving the porcelain bus this morning.” “I left him a lawn pizza.” “Toss a tiger on the carpet.” |
| NO “Pig’s arse!!” “Get Fucked!” |
| YES “Does a fat dog fart?” “Even Blind Freddy could see it.” “Is the Pope a Catholic?” “Does a Koala shit in a gum tree and wipe his ass on a Cockatoo?” “Does the Pope tuck his shirt in with a wooden spoon?” “Bloody oath!” “No wucking furries.” |
| INSULTS “I hope your ears turn into arseholes and shit on your shoulders.” “Not enough brains to give ‘imself a headache!” “About as useful as tits on a bull.” “You must be the world’s only living brain donor.” “He’s a few wanks short of an orgasm.” “She’s had more pricks than a second hand dartboard.” “He had a head on him like a sucked mango.” “May your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny down.” “He’s got a few roos loose in the top paddock.” “So stupid that he wouldn’t know a tram was up him ’til the bell rang!” “Couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery.” “Pull your lip over your head and swallow!” “As ugly as a bucket full of arseholes.” “If I had a dog that looked like him, I’d shave it’s arse and make it walk backwards.” “Got a face like a bashed in shit can.” “Couldn’t tell his ass from a hole in the ground.” “Couldn’t drive a greasy stick up a dog’s arse.” “Couldn’t organise a fuck in a brothel with a fist full of fifties.” “About as useful as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking competition.” “I’ll kick your bum till your nose bleeds!” “A stubbie short of a six pack.” “Seen better heads in a piss trough.” “You’re as handy as shit on a stick.” “Tighter than a fish’s arse.” “So tight that he wouldn’t shout if a shark bit him.” “Face like a smashed crab.” “As ugly as a bulldog chewing a wasp.” “He could talk a dog off a meatwagon.” “Fucked in the head.” “You’ve got a head like a half-eaten pastie.” “He wouldn’t go two rounds with a revolving door.” “Mate, she’s as rough as a pig’s breakfast.” “Your face is like a twisted Ugg boot.” “He’s got a face like a cat licking shit off a thistle.” “She’s been hit with the ugly stick too many times.” “She’s two pick handles wide.” “An arse like two pigs fighting in a sugar bag.” “As ugly as a bag of spanners.” “You’ve got a head like a dropped pie.” “He thinks his shit don’ stink, but his farts give him away.” “I wish his dad had settled for a blow job.” “Fell out of the ugly tree, and hit every branch on the way down.” “If I had a head like yours I’d circumcise it.” “Wouldn’t know if someone was up him sideways with an armful of deckchairs.” “As thick as two short planks!” “You got a head like a busted watermelon.” |
| COMPLIMENTS “Ya bloods worth bottling!” “He’s True Blue.” “I’d be up her like a rat up a drain pipe.” “A better man never stood in two shoes!” |
| ASSORTED “Drilling for Vegemite.” (Anal sex) “I’ll have a super.” (I’ll have a beer) “Make mine an unleaded.” (I’ll have a light beer) “Going off like a frog in a sock.” (try to picture this one) |
YOU SAID IT !
Colloquial Sayings and Stories from Contributors
INTRODUCTION:
The Australian language has evolved over more than 200 years and its still evolving – for better or worse. Words come and words go and so do what we call ‘colloquial’ phrases where we describe things and activities in our unique and often very colourful ‘slanguage’. Our language is the result of our cultural influences and, in particular, our pioneering stock which was predominately British and Irish. This became our ‘main’ influences however, because of continuing immigration, we have also taken in words and expressions, and even speech patterns, from other cultures be they European or Asian. Even the mobile telephone has affected the way we speak and what we say.
Australians in the first half of the 20th century had a reputation for speaking slowly as if this was a reflection of our ‘no worries, mate’ attitude to life. This is especially true of the stereotypical gangling bushie in the city. Some observed that we spoke with our lips hardly parted. The standard joke out of this, of course, was that we spoke this way because a wide-mouthed style would have resulted in a mouth full of flies.
The contributions in this section – and I would be grateful for additions to the list – come mainly from Sydney following a series of pars in the Sun Herald Newspaper (Peter Fitzsimmons column 2005) and I have included them verbatim. – WF
CONTRIBUTIONS:
All over the place like a mad women’s shit.
” ” ” ” ” a fart in a pickle bottle.
Behaves like a cow with a bastard calf.
Looks like a poofter out of work.
Has a voice like a billygoat shitting on tin.
With apologies & well wishes.
[Derek Swan.]
My mother-in-law, who is 89, has a favourite saying `he/she has a mouth like a torn pocket`.
She is the only person I have ever heard say it. She was born in Bulli and her parents were of English/Irish origin.
Regards
[Barry Hirst ]
As far as I know this is a true story.
An English visitor got a job in a pub down at The Rocks in the early ’50’s. She spent several hours learning the local names of the glasses, brands of beer and spirits and as much grog related jargon as they thought she would need. The first customer she got the next morning asked “Could I have two zacks for a deena?” She had no answer to that! I look forward to reading you book when it is released.
Cheers,
[ Bev Cockburn ]
The Black Horse of Sutton’s Forest
I’m wondering what other information you might have about this
legend. I am writing a novel where it plays a small role and information
seems to be spotty at best. Since one of my characters sees the
horse, I would like to know as much as I am able.
Thanks so much for any further help you can provide.
[ Catherine Summers ]
These from a 78 year old who loves his country and it’s ockerisms,
ARMY—–Drop shorts (artillerymen.)
Ginger Beers(engineers)
Greasies(cooks)
Don R(despatch rider)
90day wonder(conscript)
Foot sloggers(infanteers)
Officers(brass)Join the artillery and see the war on wheels!
Shot through(gone or AWL)
Bronzed Anzac(physically fit and tanned),
Meat wagon(ambulance),
Bible basher(religious digger)
SAYINGS—-More movement than a fiddlers elbow,
More hide than Jesse(was an elephant at the zoo),
Take a Captain Cook(look)
On the frog and toad(road),
More starts than Bernbourgh(jobs worked),
Further behind than Walla Walla(running late)
Dragging the chain(slow),
As cheeky as all get out(a brat),
A screw loose or Off your rocker(stupid),
You will finish up in the funny farm(asylum),
That will do for starters(beginnings),
Clink(gaol),
Elbow grease(effort),
Sydney coat hanger (harbour bridge),
Dogs breakfast(a mess),
Gone to Gowings(left here),
Last ride before Blondin(closing time Blondin was a circus performer, I think),
Time gentlemen please(pub 6pm closing time call),
Fez please(tram conducters call for fare payment),
More farewells than Nellie Melba(curtain calls).
[Col Henry ]
To add to your collection of sayings– from my great grand mother (born here 1860) “up in Annie’s room behind the clock” referring to something a member of the family was seeking, and of course the mother of the house was/is supposed to know where absolutely every item was/is kept. “shot through like a Bondi tram” from my father born 1916. referring to anyone who had escaped pursuit for whatever reason.
[Judith Wicks.]
Looked like the cat that swallowed the canary;
Done up like a dogs dinner;
Lit up like a Christmas tree;
Talking 10 to the dozen
like 2 peas in a pod.
Vaccinated with a gramophone needle;
As silly as a cut snake;
Full of piss & wind;
Going for a Werris Creek;
Clean the Barry Beath’s;
Took off like the robber’s dog;
Black as the ace of spades;
Short arms & long pockets;
Drinking light beer is like kissing your sister;
Happy as a pig in mud;
Flat out like a lizard drinking;
full as a tick;
silly as a 2 bob watch;
as useless as an ashtray on a motor bike;
a dead bird never falls out of its nest;
off like a bag of prawns in the sun
[ Heather Wheatley ]
Trainer Sam Fennell was told by his owner to be succinct in reporting by telegram his charge’s success – or otherwise.
Straight after the race this message hit the wires: SF,SF,SF,SF. Loosely translated it read “Started, farted, slipped (and) Fell, See Friday, Sam Fennell”
Regards
[ Noel of Newcastle ]
I guess you’ve heard the truly Oz saying “Who’s robbing this coach?”, usually said when somebody interferes during a job. Well, it originated during one of the Kelly gang’s hold-ups. Old Ned got a little confused at times, so the hold-up lines went something like this:
“Stand and deliver. We’re going to rob all the women and rape all the men”, said Ned
A male voice yelled out :”Don’t you mean, rob all the men and rape all the women?”
A lispy voice from the background said: “Who’s robbing this coach?”
Regards
[ Noel ]
Are you still looking for Aussie sayings? If so, I have a few for you, but you’ve probably heard them before:
A head like a boarding house pudding
It would kill a brown dog
To do the Harold Holt (bolt)
Short arms and long pockets
Started and farted (to begin a project but not finish it)
Like the barber’s cat – all full of piss and wind (I confess I have no idea what this one means, do you?)
More front than a rat with a gold tooth
Punters eyes (one each way)
Good luck with your book launch on Thursday.
Kind regards
[ Merril Worrad ]
Having read of your project in the Sunday Herald, I’d like to submit the following saying:
“Could pull a ton up Druitt Street”
My understanding of the saying is that it defines a good cart horse which was strong enough to pull a load of one ton up Druitt Street, probably from the wharves at Cockle Bay to George Street. The saying refers to Strength in general, and would hardly be restricted to horses now. I can’t date the saying for you. I can only say that I learnt it from my father who, I suspect, learnt it as a young fellow in the 1930’s. I hope this saying can be preserved.
Regards,
[ Mark Adams ]
Carry on like a pork chop
The above expression was originally the politcially incorrect ” Carrying on like a jew with a pork chop in a synagogue” – m eaning
some-one was carrying on in an unduly agitated or unnecessary manner.
Regards
[ Peter Wotton ]
After reading the Fitz Files a couple of weeks ago about our folklore, I can remember one, (and I’m sure I’ll be able to remember some more at some time) sayings. Maybe you have already received them but it’s worth sending them so our culture can stay alive. My mother used to say that things could be ‘as slow as a wet week’. I knew what that meant the first time my kids were on holidays from school and we had rain for the entire time.
Was dining with my daughter last night when she reminded me of another saying that has been passed down over the years – that places can be busy – ‘like Pitt Street on a Friday afternoon‘. Now, I think it should be re-phrased to be ‘like Pitt Street Mall at any given lunch time“.
Another saying which comes to mind, which I’m not too sure is Aussie or not is ‘to win a motza“.
Is there going to be a book published?
Regards,
[ Robin Roberts ]
These aren’t parochial enough to be Sydney lore. However my grandmothers(deceased) and auntie (84 and still kicking) would say:
“Black as the inside of a goat.” where there was no streetlighting or otherwise just very dark indeed.
“So far out they had to kill a man to start a cemetry“
It would be sad to lose these little gems. There aren’t many situations where they would apply.
My mother grew up in the depression and would play a game called “Sticks” whereby you would place several sticks an equal distance apart and each person would have a run-up and bound between the sticks. The distance between would then be increased for the next round, and so on, eliminating those who were unable to bound the distance until the last person was still in.
Hope your collection is published. Fair shake……
Read the piece in the Fitz files on Sunday and one of my personal favourites (heard where else but at the pub) was “It’s so windy it’d blow the sauce off a meat pie”
Good luck with your project
Tracey
[ Tracey Russell ]
I don’t know if any of the following come under any category u r after but they may be of interest. My father who passed away a couple of years ago – he was in his 90’s – often said the following:
When something was said or if something I or my brothers did – that he considered WAS REALLY STUPID he would say: “If your brains were dynamite they wouldn’t part your hair“
OR
“If your brains were made of elastic they wouldn’t make a pair of garters for a canary“.
And when my brothers or I had a ‘smart alec’ answer to anything my mother’s favorite saying was: “Well if that’s the case I think you should grease your bottom and slip into the next century as you are probably TOO GOOD for this one“
– this was delivered with a ‘clip’ over our ears.
Also as we got older and used WORDS that dad would never use, e.g. ‘conundrum’. Dad would say ” swallowed a dictionary have we?‘ and then he would repeat the following over and over adding “Randwick is racing, place yr bets – 6 to 4 conundrum“
Other sayings – probably not politically correct today:
“Camp as a row of tents“
“her acre is three axe handles wide“
The Berlei Bra being described as “an over the shoulder boulder holder“.
If you didn’t win at a sports carnival -“You couldn’t win a pie at Sargent’s picnic“
Skinny legs were described as – “his/her legs are as skinny as eleven pence scratched on a bucket“
When someone was/is sucking up to the boss “make sure u scratch yr initials on the soles of yr shoes“
When someone did something stupid – “He’s a brick short of a load” or “he’s a couple of slices short of a loaf“
[ Venetia Galvin ]
Some random insults – because Aussies do it best.
“She’s so ugly even the tide wouldn’t take her out at Bondi.”
“He’s so dumb he thought the lodger was the Victorian border”
Face like a dropped pie,
head like a welders bench
If brains were snot..you wouldnt have enough to blow ya nose
Face like a bulldog chewing wasps
face like the bottom of slatter’s bag.
Going off like a frog in a sock,
Full as a bucket with high sides.
More faces than the town clock. ( two faced)
A face that would turn milk. ( miserable sour faced)
You couldn’t mark her with an axe ( ugly)
seen bigger tits on a bird table.( flat chested)
Got too much of what the cat licks it’s arse with ( too much to say.
Her tongue goes like the clatter-bane o fa ducks arse ( talks all the time)
tight a a ducks or fish’s arse.( mean/stingy)
he could peel an orange in his pocket ( again mean / stingy)
Face like a bee stung welders bench
The term ‘Double Dutch’ in Australian language implies the speaker is not making sense. Where did this term originate?
Although Australia had many early Dutch emigrants in the 19th century, and their language very guttural and strange sounding to our ears, I suspect the term might have originated in the Music Halls, where the Dutch were often ridiculed in songs and humour. For example, Florie Forde, the great Melbourne-born international music hall star sang a song titled ‘The Van Dam Family’.
Florrie Forde sings ‘The Van Dam Family’
There is also a possibility the language came from Pennsylvania where many Dutch migrated. Whichever or whatever the case the term was well-known in Australia and used against people who were supposedly talking nonsense – either intentionally or unintentionally.
It belongs to secret languages like ‘Butcher’s speak’ where the second half of the word is transplanted to the front of the word etc. Butchers used to speak this secret language in all those years where they worked behind the counter in front of customers. It was common for butchers to make comment on a pretty woman entering the shop – she, of course, would be none the wiser.
School children, and in fact childish adults, enjoyed making secret languages and, of course, in the days before television, they had more time and situation to create such vehicles.
Here is a guide to speaking Double Dutch.
Review the alphabet. The letters of the alphabet follow the usual pattern of the words in Double Dutch
A-a-va-gaa
B-b-bee
C-c-va-gee
D-d-va-gee
E-e-va-gee
F-ev-a-gef
G-g-va-gee
H-h-va-gach
I-i-va-gi
J-j-va-gay
K-k-va-gay
L-ev-a-gel
M-ev-a-gem
N-ev-a-gen
O-o-va-go
P-p-va-ee
Q-q-va-gu
R-r-va-ga
S-ev-a-gess
T-t-iv-a-gee
U-u-va-gu
V-viv-a-gee
W-duvagub-buvagle-u-va-gu
X-ev-a-gex
Y-y-va-guy
Z-ziv-a-gee
Look at an example. “Mary had a little lamb” becomes “Ma-va-gar-r-va-ga-ry ha-va-gad a-va-gay li-va-gi-t-va-gle la-va-gamb”
Mary: Ma-va-gar-r-va-ga-ry
Had: ha-va-gad
A : a-va-gay
Little: li-va-gi-t-va-gle
Lamb: la-va-game
Each Syllable is broken in two and “vag” is put in between it. The letter before the “vag” is also repeated after the “vag”.
Letters: Le-vag-et-te-vag-ers Note that the letter before the change in a syllable is also repeated.
sample one syllable word.
Take the first letter of the word (eg. hip) h is the first letter of the word, put uh- after it, making it h-uh, next put “tha” after it making it huh-the then you take the rest of the word, but put g in front of it g-ip, which make, h-uh the g-ip.
Here is a sample paragraph written in Double Dutch
Double Dutch: Bevageefovagore govagoivaging ovagon avagay bivagike rivagide, mavagayke suvagure tovago ovagoil yovagour chavagayin, avagaynd mavagayke suvagure yovagour whevageels avagayre sevageecure. Strevageetch yovagour bovagody thovagorvagaoughlevagely avagaynd drivagink plevageentyvagy ovagof wavagatevager. Mavagap ovagout yovagour rovagoute avagayhevageead ovagof tivagime sovago yovagou cavagayn evageeasivagily fivagind avagaypprovagoprivagiavagayte bivagike pavagayths avagaynd lavagaynes. Ivagit ivagis avagay govagood ivagidevageea tovago havagave revageeflevagectivagive mavagaytevageerivagial ovagon yovagour clovagothes avagayt avagayll tivagimes ivagin cavagase yovagou evageend uvagup rivagidivaging ivagin thevagee davagayrk. Bevagee avagaywavagayre ovagof cavagayrs avagayrovagound yovagou, avagaynd nevageevevageer livagistevageen tovago muvagusivagic whivagile rivagidivaging.
English: Before going on a bike ride, make sure to oil your chain, and make sure your wheels are secure. Stretch your body thoroughly and drink plenty of water. Map out your route ahead of time so you can easily find appropriate bike paths and lanes. It is a good idea to have reflective material on your clothing at all times in case you end up riding in the dark. Be aware of cars around you, and never listen to music while riding.
The term is also applied to schoolyard skipping games. Here is an astonishing You Tube clip showing American kids, male and female, presenting some extremely complex double dutch skipping.
Here are some Australian newspaper items related to Double Dutch language.
The Queenslander Aug 20 1898. Flotsam and Jetsam Column ‘Revenge’.
From Mr. Cooke’s verses in dialect we quote these lines on “Revenge”:
Ven ich and Gretchen married got,
Mein olt frient Dunckelsch warzenrath
He dou’d coom vere my veddln ees,
Becos I nefer gone by hees ! ‘
Alter, I get me efen yet.
Dot Dunckelschwarsenrath is deat.
don’d go by hees fooneral —nein !—
Becos he nefer gone by mine !
Flotsam and Jetsam.
The Queenslander. 15 Dec 1877
Flotsam and Jetsam.
“Per Bacco!”
‘Some more Tobacco.‘” JONATHAN DOWNES.
A DUTCHMAN, sitting by the Zuyder Zee,
Of man’s creation solved the mystery,
As, drinking deep and thinking ponderously.
He smoked Tobacco.
Said he, ” Van first in order of creation,
Happy, till woman comes to cause vexation;
Then Jove is sorry, and, for consolation,
Gives him Tobacco. “
For Jove himself, when Juno, unaware,
Finds out his ‘little games’, and storms away
. And with his thunderbolts combs out his hair—
Ho lighto his ‘ ‘baccy.’ “
So I ‘when lovely woman stoops to folly,’
And jilts me for another—am not jolly ;
But yet, ‘ a pill to purge my melancholy’
I find in’ ‘Baccy,’ “
And when the tax-collector to my gates
Comes, t’ax for cash, and rate me for my rates;
ln short, when any trouble agitates,
I smoke Tobacco.
” Therefore, with that sage seaman I agree,
Who ask’d, when granted fairy wishes three. *
‘Baccy enough, some beer, and then, said he.
Some more!
Geelong Advertiser 3 June 1844
Germans were often associated with Dutch and they also experienced a German-Australian or Double German language. There is a large collection of this material, including many poems, under the section Joseph Lister.
GERMAN EMIGRANTS’ SONG.
Hurra! Hurra! Hurra! Hurra!
We’re off unto Australia !
What shall we take to our new land ?
AII sorts of things from every hand!
Confederation protocols:
Heaps of tax and budget rolls;
A whole shipload of skins to fill
With proclamations just at will.
Or when to the south land we come,
The German will not feel at home .
Hurra! Hurra! Hurra! Hurra!
We’re off unto Australia ?
So what shall we take to our new land ?
All sorts of things from every hand
A brave supply of corporals canes ;
Of livery suits a hundred wains..
Cockades, gay caps to fill a house, and
Armorial buttons a hundred thousand
Or when to the southern land we come
The German will not feel at home !
Hurra! Hurra! Hurra! Hurra!
We’re off unto Australia.
What shall we take to our new land?
All sorts of things from every hand..
Chamberlain’s keys, a pile of sacks ;
Books of full blood-descents in packs;
Dog-chains and sword-chains by the ton,
Of order ribbons bales twenty-one.
Or when to the southern land we come
The German will not feel at home.
Hurra! Hurra! Hurra! Hurra!
We’re off unto Australia.
What shall we take to our new land?
All sorts of things from every hand;
Scullcaps, periwigs, old world airs;
Crutches, privileges. easy-chairs;
Councillor’s titles, private lists,
Nine hundred and ninety thousand chests.
Or when to the southern land we come T
The German will not feel at home.
Queensland Figaro 22 Nov 1884
Song of the German. Farmer.
I’m a German farmer, that. I am,
I don’t gare a cent for Dutton or Sam,
I makes my butter, cheese and jam,
Chust like a .German, farmer;
I drives to down, and dakes my beer,
Drives home again in right goot cheer,
And buts a lettle part each year,
Like any odder farmer.
Chorus.
For Sam may wriggle, twist about,
His dodges now are all found out,
And Billy Miles may grunt and shout,
And Dickson twirl his beard about,
‘ Nee-haw, ” Nee-haw,” ’tis Brookes’s bray,
He’s Sam’s lackey,
Hooroo for a German farmer.
I like to hear the news, you know,
How railways fare, and Land Bills go;
Read Zeitung, Punch, and Figaro .
Just like an odder farmer.
Sam wants to bring, poor Germans here,
To work for dwenty pounds a year,
But Gott in Himmel, never fear!
You trust a German farmer.
For Sam will wriggle to the end;
And Dutton Land Bill clauses mend,
And “Bully”‘ pose as poor man’s friend,
Ane Sherry dredges Northward send. .
“Nee-haw,” “Nee-haw,”.’tis Brookes’s bray,
He’s Sam’s lackey;
Hooroo for a German farmer. …
Warren Fahey acknowledges WikiHow in preparing this article.
THE BUSHMAN’S BIBLE
The History of The Bulletin
(This article first appeared in The Bulletin magazine 1st February 2005)
Life in the Australian bush of the nineteenth century was intolerably lonely and, for many, especially the itinerant workforce, made worse by the lack of intellectual stimulation. Despite being a time of general enlightenment and relatively high standards of education, reading material was often difficult and expensive to obtain. For these reasons almanacs, reciters, songsters and pulp fiction, mainly cheap detective and western novels, became the reading fodder of the masses. The arrival of The Bulletin Magazine in January 1880 considerably changed this for here was a national weekly, which, from its first issue, spoke to both the city and bush with a distinctive Australian voice.
For the first thirty-five of its one hundred and twenty-five years The Bulletin enjoyed the affectionate moniker of The Bushman’s Bible; and with good reason. Founded by J F Archibald and John Haynes, the fiery weekly delivered Australian thought, passion and spirit at a time when the nation sat at the crossroads of immense economic, political and social change. It was a brave publication where nationalism was a major focus as it vigorously waved the flag of protectionism over free trade, and declared an editorial policy that, from today’s perspective, would probably meet with the approval of One Nation and certain Communist ideologies, as The Bulletin’s banner openly addressed the burning issues of the day:
- A republic form of government.
- Australia for the Australians.
- The cheap Chinaman, the cheap nigger, and the cheap European pauper to be absolutely excluded.
- The entire abolition of the private ownership of land.
- The abolition of titles of so-called ‘nobility’.
The bush was in turmoil in the 1880s and although the bulk of the population lived and worked in the country, the cities were also growing and flexing their muscles. Rural workers, especially shearers, were rolling up their shirtsleeves in preparation for a ‘donnybrook’ with the cocky landowners and station managers who had kept them down for far too long. The shearing huts and cattle camps buzzed with talk of unprecedented rebellion and strike action. The Bushman’s Bible fanned these fires with cartoons, poetry, editorial and sly comment that would have provoked many a worker’s campsite discussion and argument. There was also a general misguided belief that the owners of the magazine were ‘battlers’ and therefore taking the side of their loyal reader mates.
Published out of Sydney by two acknowledged ‘cityslickers’, the magazine’s appeal to the average bush worker was established after only a few issues. Haynes departed the magazine in 1885 leaving the brilliant and somewhat eccentric Archibald to steer it down bush track and city street. The fact that The Bulletin has remained in continual publication is a tribute to Archibald’s tenacity and original vision.
By the 1890s the magazine was irreverent, self opinionated and sometimes downright antagonistic as it reported politics, the federation debate, unionism, social gossip, entertainment, and news from the colonies and abroad. It wasn’t necessarily aimed at the bush and its news was usually somewhat out of date by the time the erratic mail train arrival and eventual local delivery to the station or worker huts. This didn’t seem to matter and it was said that its enthusiastic audience even ‘read between the ink’. There was some specific rural news including recent wool sales, wheat export figures and mining half year results but all these were available in the general press, and usually with more reliability.
This was the era of top hats and bush hats with quite evident social differences. The Bulletin tried to steer a middle path. One imagines that the bush people got quite a laugh out of the coverage of city political events as the magazine was never short of witty cartoons, caricatures and satires. This probably reinforced their view of the unfathomable ‘Big Smoke’ and of city dwellers as fools. Quips like the following would have certainly raised an eyebrow or two: ”A dog cart with ‘debt collector’ painted around it, and drawn by a dun pony, is now an everyday sight in some parts of Sydney.’ (1894). Then there were the magazine’s often unflattering and unrealistic impressions of the bush including cartoons lampooning bush characters, especially cadging swagmen, lambed-down shearers and stingy squatters.
The Bulletin’s appeal to its city readers, and it had many, grew from its political coverage, especially in the federation debates, its biting social and entertainment reportage, and in its fiercely anti-imperialism stance. This was an era of unprecedented free thought and, more importantly, free speech. It must also be mentioned that the drift to the cities had already commenced and by Federation, in 1901, the population balance had swung in favour of the coastal cities.
During the ‘nervous nineties’ the city folk, like their bush brothers and sisters, were trying to work out what exactly did the bush represent. Was it the real Australia? Where did that place the rapidly growing cities? How was the Australian different from the Englishman? These questions were important to a nation attempting to define itself at the dawn of nationhood. The Bulletin appeared braver than most journals, especially by its self-promotion as the Bushman’s Bible, and by its romanticising of bush life through stories and verse.
We are not certain where the phrase Bushman’s Bible originated but we do know as early as January 22, 1881, the magazine advertised, ‘Every bushman should have The Bulletin mailed to him every quarter.’ In the December 15 issue, 1888, it went as far as to describe itself as ‘The Bushman’s Bible’. It also regularly promoted itself saying, ‘The Bulletin’s red cover is equally familiar to the bushman of the far north, the stockman of Central Australia, the pearl sheller of Torres Straits, as the digger in the New Zealand ranges. A paper which is at once the most popular city publication and the organ of the intelligent bushman must indeed be broadly based…’
There were other magazines but somehow they never spoke to the bush like The Bulletin. Archibald, ever jealous of his magazine’s place, openly ridiculed other publications; especially those that dared to challenge him. ‘Town and Country Journal’ was repeatedly called ‘Down and Gumtree Jernil’ and, in 1894, a Bulletin par sarcastically noted ‘The Ipswich Times explains that The Bulletin is not a ‘yahoo journal’ – “It was all a mistake, the Bulletin, it seems is, “one of the finest,” and so on.’
Unlike earlier weekly publications such as Melbourne Punch, Sydney Punch, The Lantern, Sam Slick, and so on, The Bulletin had successfully bridged the gap between city and bush readers and benefited from improved delivery systems and a flow of controversial issues. The magazine had a good ‘nose’ for news stories.
The role and rights of labour were hotly debated topics that inevitably brought in the question of racism. The Bulletin hardly ever shied away from this issue and as late as the 1950s still carried the legend: Australia for the white man. In the 1890s a bitter fight erupted as Chinese scab labourers were hired to take the place of striking shearers. The Bulletin struck back with cartoons showing Chinese and other foreigners taking over all areas of industry and commerce. This racism was not restricted to the bush and in 1894 it reported ‘Shop signs from the corner of Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, to the corner of Spring Street, inclusive numbers on the same side: Assid Michael, Habib Khyal, Ellias Nathan, A. H. Schunke, Kong Goon and A. Khaled’. Jews, typifying big business, were also a regular target, especially in cartoons, inevitably with large hooked noses, and referred to as kikes and Hebrews. This was all the more surprising considering Archibald’s claim of being half-Jewish.
The Bulletin appeared at a time when consumerism was taking giant leaps as new inventions, products and services became available and needed to be advertised. During the 1890s strikes the economy suffered and it is difficult to reconcile how The Bulletin’s stated antagonistic policy towards private ownership could sit comfortably with its major advertisers, especially those advertising land sales and announcing investment prospectus. It certainly didn’t stop them advertising.
The advertisements of the early Bulletin were of particular interest to readers and, considering the large number of repeat advertisers, it must have been a successful way to get products known nationally. Many of these advertisements were aimed at the bush workers who generally suffered from bad nutrition, all manner of aches and pains and, the two most common ailments: bad blood and nerves. Scott’s Emulsion offered cod liver oil as ‘hypophosphorus’, Rowland’s Macassar Oil prevented ‘hair falling out’, Frazer’s Sulphur Tablets ‘the pearl of medicine’ were ‘ideal for purifying blood, rheumatism, gout, chills, warding off diphtheria, small pox and all infections and epidemic complaints‘. Krupp’s Galvanic Chain Belt prevented ‘nervousness’ and, supposedly as a last resort, one could order ‘Dr William’s Pink Pills for pale people.’
Yorkshire Relish boldly advertised itself ‘for steaks, chops, cold meat, fish, soup and entrees. Makes cold meat a luxury! The plainest viands palatable and blends admirably with all gravies.’
There were quite a few advertisements for imported whiskey and local ales but surprisingly few for tobacco products. Drunkenness ‘or the liquor habit‘ could be ‘cured by Golden Specific’ – “It can be given in a cup of coffee or tea or in food with or without the knowledge of the patient.” Hotels were also frequent advertisers Aaron’s Exchange Hotel advising country people that it was ‘The leading hotel for pastoralists in Sydney – situated opposite the Land’s Office and Sydney Wool Sale Rooms’. The Federal Hotel in Melbourne simply advised it had ‘500 rooms’.
Advertising also represented the latest fads of the day, especially cycling, with large promotions for Swift Cycles, Dunlop Tyres, and in an advertisement for Austral Cycles reported that: ‘A. Macdonald rode from Port Darwin to Adelaide – 2050 miles in 28 days 6 hours – on a Swift Bicycle with Dunlop Tyres.’ Such news would have been hotly discussed in the work camps and no doubt led to many itinerant shearers purchasing a bicycle to transport themselves across the country.
If the advertisements were read enthusiastically then the general news and reports were positively devoured. Archibald certainly knew what he was doing in devising a magazine based on extremely short pars. Many bush people were poor readers and 200-300 word pars suited them to the ground, though the extremely small print must have been irritating considering the poor standard of spectacles and lighting.
Undoubtedly the policy of soliciting reader contributions played a major role in the overall success of The Bulletin and its mythical position as the Bushman’s Bible. The magazine stated: ‘All correspondence acknowledged and 300 words invited.‘ And write they did – in the thousands. To get paid contributors had to present their published cutting at the Pitt Street office. Although this system must have been an accounting nightmare it has been said that the majority of contributors usually bought an additional one or two copies ‘to show their friends back home.’ It was a system that certainly worked for the magazine’s finances!
Sidney J. Baker, author of pioneering works on our language commented: “The simple facts are that the material on bush lore, slang and idiom, collected by thousands of writers in The Bulletin pages is absolutely irreplaceable.”
It was within the pages of the Correspondence and Aboriginalities sections of the magazine that Archibald seems to have had the most fun. In an 1894 issue he advises a J. M. Davis: “You want the dreadful thing returned. Fortunately for yourself, you’ve forgotten to give your address.” To L.G. of Wagga Wagga it is a curt, “Namby Pamby. Send to Young Ladies’ Journal.” P.M. NSW gets an intriguing: “Do you usually want to ‘repair the spotless lustre to your pedal extremities?’ In short, do you usually blacken and polish your feet! That and similar exalted vapourings have ensured the return of your mss as desired.”
The reports of current entertainments were just as brief with the editor showing no fear or favour. In 1892: ‘Randolph the Reckless has been doing moderately well at the Royal, notwithstanding its inherent imbecility and specially weak spots.” And another comments, “Caicedo, the bounding wanderer of the wire, went through a form of nearly losing his balance, the other night, since when public interest in the little South American Spaniard has made another spurt.”
It was not unusual to read a single tantalising line such as ‘Patrick come home, father dead. Brother Timothy. Richmond, Victoria.’ (1890), or, in the social jottings, ‘The red straw hat is the newest fad of the Melba swells.’ (1894). Pars such as these gave the magazine a sense of familiarity that would have sparked the imagination of its readers.
Above all, it was The Bulletin’s publication of Australian writers that reinforced its place as the Bushman’s Bible. Through prose and verse these contributors helped define ‘the real Australian’ as male, white and a hard-yakka worker. We could be colonial-born or British ‘new chum’, and while acknowledging The Bulletin’s nationalist and anti-imperialist philosophy, we were not anti-British. If anything, we saw ourselves as whiter than white and better than British. We had been born of a cruel convict system, grew up in the bush and were now living in God’s-own country. Henry Lawson, ‘Banjo’ Paterson, Henry Kendall, Victor Daly, G. H. ‘Ironbark’ Gibson, Will Ogilvie and George Essex Evans, to name only a few, delivered a steady literary diet that shaped and reshaped the Australian identity. Much of their writing echoed the bohemian traits of new urban journalism, being almost a caricature of the Australian legendary characteristics portrayed by the journal: mateship, unionism, anti-wowser, anti-authority – whilst earnestly cheering drinking and gambling, and nodding to republicanism. It was the Bushman’s Bible that carried this mythical creation to the bush and back.
‘Banjo’ Paterson, Old Bush Songs & The Bulletin
When the enterprising proprietors of The Bulletin threw open their shutters in 1880, most Australians lived in the country. Twenty years later, that majority had shifted to the cities. The poet A.B. ‘Banjo’ Paterson played a leading role in bridging the dramatic social change by collecting and publishing the old bush songs treasured by generations of Australians.
The latter part of the nineteenth century, especially the last decade, had seen the world turned upside down. Steam power found a rival in electricity, sailing ships developed funnels, not sails and masts, and science continued to announce amazing new discoveries, new and revolutionary inventions were unveiled. Thomas Edison was experimenting with the battery and the telephone, Albert Einstein was formulating his theory of relativity, and early experiments in powered flight were under way. All these things were beginning to bring about massive social change in Australia as elsewhere.
By the mid-1890s, Australia had experienced almost a decade of bitter confrontations between workers and employers, especially on the land. This coincided with a very severe economic depression, which saw a drift away from the bush to the coastal fringes, and in particular to the big cities where factory work was to be found.
As Australians became more urban people, their nostalgia for the bush – as something unique, something Australian – grew and developed. It was through literature, music and painting about the bush that we defined our national identity. The old bush songs were one of those signposts. Australia’s cities at the changing of the century had a character of their own. We didn’t want our cities to be like London. We didn’t want to have upper-class British accents, top hats and snobbish attitudes. We were comfortable with city life as long as we could still salute the bush as our birthright. And as time passed, our feeling for the bush ceased to be nostalgia and became mythical.
Andrew Barton Paterson typified many Australians of his time: he was born in the bush and lived in the city. He became a successful solicitor in Sydney, but his verse almost denied his city life. He came to national attention, almost becoming a household name, with the publication of The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses in 1895, establishing a particular view of the bush and leaving his audience hungry for more.
At about the time The Man from Snowy River was published, Paterson was actively collecting old bush songs. Others were doing the same. Small pocket-sized books called songsters containing song words had been popular on the goldfields and in the cities for over fifty years. Some, such as the goldrush songsters of Charles Thatcher, offered original songs that eventually moved from the printed page to the oral tradition. The Queenslander’s New Colonial Campfire Song Book, published in Sydney in 1865, offered seventeen songs, some by its editor, Phillip Somer (‘Remos’) that also moved into the bush song tradition, namely ‘‘The Overlanders’ and some anonymous songs including ‘‘Wallaby Joe’ and ‘The Stockman’s Last Bed’.
Newspapers and magazines also played an important role in bringing together the old songs of the bush. The Hurd Collection, a newspaper cutting book held in the State Library of Queensland, offers forty typical bush songs published between 1894 and 1900, including several subsequently appearing in Paterson’s collection. Some, too, were published on the Bulletin’s famous Red Page, the weekly literary page where Paterson also sought contributions from readers. Many believed the bush was being sold short; even the Bulletin in the late 1890s appeared more interested in city politics, commerce and industry than the changes in the bush.
Considering Paterson’s status in both the bush and the city and the Bulletin’s circulation, one assumes he received many songs. But, though he started advertising in 1895, it was ten years before the manuscript, which he had entitled Old Bush Songs, reached the publishers Angus and Robertson. Of course, Paterson was working full-time as a solicitor for the firm of Street & Paterson, as well as preparing another volume of verse (Rio Grande’s Last Race and Other Verses, published by Angus and Robertson in 1902) and maintaining a steady flow of articles and verses to magazines and newspapers, not to mention his stint as a correspondent during the Boer War. Still, ten years is a long time for any publisher to wait for a manuscript. Perhaps this letter from the firm’s managing director, George Robertson, written in April 1905, might have convinced him to deliver:
A B Paterson Esq.,
Evening News Office
Dear Paterson
There is money for both of us in that old bush songs volume. Do get together what material you have and let us get it out even if it only makes a slender volume. No doubt the first edition would only be a tentative one; but it would bring in plenty of material for the second if you asked for it in the prefix. Stephens (of the Bulletin) will do it if we don’t.
It is no use asking you about your novels, I suppose. I wish you were hard up – we would get them then all right!
Yours Faithfully
George Robertson
George Robertson undoubtedly thought that a book of bush songs would make enough money to warrant subsequent editions, and he was right. When Old Bush Songs Composed and Sung in the Bushranging, Digging and Overlanding Days was published in 1905, its success was immediate. Angus and Robertson printed and published in Sydney and E. W. Cole simultaneously published in Melbourne. It was reprinted in 1906, 1912, followed by a six-year break, no doubt because of WW1. Paterson offered a revised and enlarged edition in 1924 with reprints in 1926 and 1929, followed by a revised edition with an additional song in 1930. In 1932, the eighth edition appeared, probably the worst year of the Great Depression, evidence of the book’s continuing popularity. In 1937 an associated publication ‘Swagman’s Treasures: Five Campfire Ditties – words from Paterson’s Old Bush Songs’ was published with music by L. Lavater. In 1957 the Bulletin’s literary editor, Douglas Stewart and Bulletin contributor, Nancy Keesing, edited a considerably enlarged and revised edition as ‘Old Bush Songs and Rhymes of Colonial Times’, which was reprinted in 1967 and 1976. In 1983, Angus and Robertson, who had published all the proceeding editions, issued Graham Seal’s revised edition ‘Banjo Paterson’s Old Bush Songs’, the first edition with musical transcriptions. In 1987 Times House Publishing republished the Stewart and Keesing collection as part of their Collector’s Library series.
The role of George Robertson should not be underestimated. Angus and Robertson played a major role in encouraging Australian prose and verse, and published the writing of Henry Lawson, Henry Kendall, Victor Daly, Will Lawson, George Essex Evans and Will Ogilvie, to name only half a dozen. Robertson maintained a very healthy relationship with J. F. Archibald, editor of the Bulletin, in whose pages most of the well-known writers of the time appeared, and was also encouraged to publish local works by Fred Wymack, the firm’s original office boy, who later became a noted expert on Australiana and a director of the publishing firm. It is possible that Wymack was the instigator of the Old Bush Songs project.
Andrew Barton Paterson was born on 17 February 1864 at Narambla, near Orange in New South Wales, not far from Ophir where Australia’s first payable gold was discovered in 1851. Life on ‘Buckenbah’, the Paterson station, was a continual battle against the elements and the banks until eventually the place was sold and, with another bank loan, the Paterson family purchased ‘Illalong’, situated in the more fertile district around Yass. This move was followed by more bad luck and this property also went under the auctioneer’s hammer. The new owner, Henry Brown, also owned the adjoining two properties and offered Andrew Paterson senior a position as manager of all three properties.
It was in this district that the young ‘Barty” (as he was known) grew up and where, as a five-year old, he gained his first-hand knowledge of bush life and heard the old stories and songs. In 1896 he wrote to Thomas Whitley of Blackheath: ‘While living in the bush I used to hear a great lot of bush songs, ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’, ‘Dunn, Gilbert and Ben Hall’, ‘The Squatter’s Man’, ‘The Old Bark Hut’ and so forth … I would like to find out something about these and get the words.’
Paterson further explained his original purpose in the preface to the 1905 edition of his collection:
The object of the present publication is to gather together all the old bush songs that are worth remembering. Apart from other considerations, there are many Australians who will be reminded by these songs of the life of the shearing sheds, the roar of the diggings townships, and the campfires of the overlanders. The diggings are all deep sinking now, the shearing is done by contract, and the cattle are sent by rail to market, while newspapers travel all over Australia; so there will be no more bush ballads composed and sung, as these were composed and sung, as records of the early days of the nation. In their very roughness, in their absolute lack of any mention of home ties or of the domestic affections, they proclaim their genuineness. They were collected from all parts of Australia, and have been patched together by the compiler to the best of his abilities, with the idea of presenting the song as nearly as possible as it was sung, rather than attempting to soften any roughness or irregularity of metre. Attempts to ascertain the names of the authors have produced contradictory statements, and no doubt some of the songs were begun by one man and finished or improved by another, or several others. Some few fairly recent ballads have been included, but for the most part no attempt has been made to include any of the more ambitious literary productions of modern writers. This collection is intended to consist of the old bush songs as they were sung in the early days, and as such it is placed before the reader
Many of the songs sent to Paterson were still in copyright, and we now know that he used only half of the material forwarded to him. The writer and folklorist Hugh Anderson comments that ‘The essential point is Paterson was actively helping to manufacture a tradition by emphasising “an image of the bush” and including those poems that gave a flavour “of bush life” as he knew it.
In reality the main concerns of old bush songs appear to be those of men. Professor of Folklore at Curtin University, Graham Seal, puts them into perspective: ‘Men working, fighting, drinking, battling on through thick and thin. Women rarely have central roles in the stories told through these songs. In accordance with the dominant values and practices of the nineteenth century, women are seen mainly in the roles of wives, mothers or barmaids. Paterson acknowledged, even celebrated, this in his Introduction: ‘In their very roughness, in their absolute lack of any mention of home ties or of the domestic affections, they proclaim their genuineness’, he wrote. Also largely absent, despite the inclusion of two untranslated Aboriginal song texts, are Aborigines and migrants from places other than Britain. The old bush song is very much about working, white males who spend much of their leisure time drinking, gambling, fighting and skiting.’
Despite searching the files of the Bulletin, the Angus and Robertson correspondence and the correspondence of J.F. Archibald, this writer has not succeeded in finding any of Paterson’s early correspondence relating to his collection. In fact, very little Paterson correspondence has survived which is puzzling considering his long and illustrious career. What a treasure-trove such a find could offer! Collectors dream of discovering a file with letters from old bushies, possibly written with ‘a thumbnail dipped in tar’, and filled with songs rejected by Paterson, not to mention variants of known songs and even some leads as to authorship. Very few Paterson manuscripts survive and those that do are distributed across several libraries. And perhaps the scribblings of poorly schooled bushmen were considered worthless by some office-hand ordered to ‘clean up the files’ in times gone by.
However, we do have Paterson’s excellent introductory essay:
Australia’s history is so short, and her progress has been so wonderfully rapid, that, seeing things as they are to-day, it is hard to believe that among us still are men who can remember the days when convicts in irons tramped the streets of Sydney, and it was unsafe to go to and from Sydney and Parramatta without an armed escort; who were partakers of the roaring days of the diggings, when miners lit their pipes with five-pound notes and shod their horses with gold; who have exchanged shots with Gilbert and Morgan, and have watched the lumbering police of the old days scouring the country to earn the thousand pounds’ reward on the head of Ben Hall. So far as materials for ballads go, the first sixty or seventy years of our history are equal to about three hundred years of the life of an old and settled nation. The population of the country comprised a most curious medley. Among the early settlers were some of the most refined and educated, and some of the most ignorant, people on the face of the earth. Among the assisted immigrants and currency lads of the earlier days education was not a strong point; and such newspapers as there were could not be obtained by one-half of the population, and could not be read by a very large percentage of the other half. It is no wonder, then, that the making of ballads flourished in Australia just as it did in England, Scotland, and Ireland in the days before printing was in common use. And it was not only in the abundance of matter that the circumstances of the infant Colony were favourable to ballad-making. The curious upheavals of Australian life had set the Oxford graduate carrying his swag and cadging for food at the prosperous homestead of one who could scarcely write his name; the digger, peeping out of his hole — like a rabbit out of his burrow — at the licence hunters, had, perhaps, in another clime charmed cultivated audiences by his singing and improvisation; the bush was full of ne’er-do-wells — singers and professional entertainers and so on — who had ‘come to grief’ and had to take to hard work to earn a crust to carry them on until they could ‘strike a new patch’. No wonder that, with all this talent to hand, songs and ballads of a rough sort were plentiful enough.
In reading various source materials, including the Angus and Robertson correspondence files, one gets the impression that after the first edition Paterson grew tired of the search and it was his publisher who was keen to add new material to further editions. One assumes Paterson instigated and completed the book in the first place because he felt the times were changing so dramatically and the book would document one of the crossover points in Australian social history.
One hundred years seems a long time in history, but not for songs. The real change, of course, has been in the way we use song as entertainment. When Paterson started collecting songs he also predicted their imminent demise. In some ways he was correct; however, traditional music tends to be surprisingly hardy and resilient to immediate change. The late John Meredith and other collectors such as Ron Edwards, Norm O’Connor and Mary-Jean Officer quite successfully collected bush songs right through the 1950s, including many variants of songs originally published in Paterson’s collection. Whilst today’s collectors still record traditional songs, it has become increasingly rare to record a song as sung over one hundred years ago. Today’s harvest, mostly collected in conjunction with the Oral History and Folklore Archive of the National Library of Australia, usually includes songs from our industrial heritage, the wars, the 1930s Depression, and novelty songs, though it is reasonable to say that bush songs and bush dance music are still in the tradition.
The four main areas where the music tradition still shows itself are instrumental music, parodies, bawdy song, and children’s playground songs. This is more a reflection of how we use music than a measure of fading popularity. When Paterson revised Old Bush Songs in 1924 and when Stewart and Keesing produced their collection, home entertainment was still a reality. The popularity of radio and especially television changed everything from the mid 1950s. The centenary edition sets out to enhance Paterson’s original work by tracking the songs and their history and also of the book itself. Songs collected in the past fifty years have been added and the scope of the book widened.
It is reasonable to ask: what is the relevance of old bush songs in the twenty-first century? A century has passed since the publication of Paterson’s collection and well over two hundred years since the first bush songs were sung. So much of our world has changed so dramatically that one would imagine such old songs have no place in a society dominated by commercially fabricated and mostly electronically distributed entertainment. But these somewhat unsophisticated songs have a real role, not simply as curious library items. They are very much a living expression of our unique culture; being keys to our past and future by helping us define our national identity at a time where we are galloping towards global uniformity.
It is important to accept that average Australians wrote the majority of these songs to do little more than express incidents and emotions in their own lives. They were not composed and distributed for commercial gain but for pure entertainment. The fact that the songs were circulated, mostly by being sung around campfires, on the track, on verandahs, around kitchen tables and as ‘party pieces’ at social events, is a testament to their longevity and place in the tradition. They were not always sung in the bush, for city folk also saw them as part of their lives and a way of respecting those people, especially workers, who lived in the bush. Most importantly, these songs are part of a continuing tradition, for traditional songs never date. Australians still sing these songs and write new songs in that same bush ballad style.
There was a time when every Tom, Dick and Nancy had a ‘party piece’ and, more often than not, an Australian ‘party piece’. If you couldn’t hold a tune you could recite one of the galloping rhymes like ‘Tangmalangaloo’, ‘The Lights of Cobb and Co’, ‘The Man from Snowy River’, ‘Clancy of the Overflow’, ‘The Man From Ironbark’, ‘Said Hanrahan’, and countless other poems born and circulated around the same time as our bush songs. These songs and poems are part of a noble tradition and are still treasured; don’t be too surprised if that stockbroker in the city, the cab driver navigating through the suburbs, or the people living next door, happen to know a few verses. The days of campfires have been replaced with barbecues, stock rides by highway drives and the lounge room piano by the television set, but given the right opportunity, homemade entertainment has a habit of resurfacing. We need more face-to-face stories in our lives, preferably without canned laughter and programmed applause.
‘Old Bush Songs: the centenary edition of Banjo Paterson’s classic collection’, edited by Warren Fahey and Graham Seal, was published by ABC Books.
Warren Fahey 2006
Some twenty years ago a friend gave me an old autograph album he had found in a garage sale in Darlinghurst, Sydney. It originally belonged to a ‘Maggie Someone’ who, for a time, lived in Chatswood, Sydney. The album was commenced on 1st January 1908 and is inscribed ‘To dear Maggie – from her loving sister Florrie’. The last entry was 1916.
Autograph albums first appeared in any great numbers in Australia in the 1830s and 40s, increasing in popularity in the sentimental seventies and elegant eighties when they were considered to be ‘quite the fashion’. The custom appears to have originated in the mid-sixteenth century in Europe with university students carrying a small leather-bound album amiculum to record the comments and hopefully approving sentiments of their patrons, protectors, companions and comrades. Students travelled widely then and a book of hand-penned references was of practical value as well as a pleasant sentimental pastime. Albums then moved into the parlours of Europe, and particularly Britain, and into history.
An old man writing in Chamber’s Journal (Saturday, August 30, 1873), reminisced: “Those who can look back for half a century will remember the rage there was in their youthful days for albums…. legion was not a name multitudinous enough for them; literary men crouched under their tyranny; young maidens wielded them as rods of iron… Splendid books they were in their day, bound in rich morocco and gold, and often containing contributions from Scott, Moore, Montgomery and Praed; whilst Prout’s beautiful sketches adorned their pages side by side with other artists.”
The anonymous observer names four of the most popular literary figures of the English-speaking world that were much quoted in diaries, newspapers and magazines. They were seen as benchmarks of civilisation and any respectable man or woman was expected to know passages and witticisms. They were also quoted in autograph albums.
With the advancement of book printing and binding in the late nineteenth century, autograph albums became affordable and popular. They were seen as a ‘craze’ and continued their popularity into the mid twentieth century.
Albums came in all shapes and sizes however the standard was approximately 8” x 7” with a decorative cover, usually inscribed as ‘Album’ (remember these are pre photographs), and containing blank pages. Autograph albums were considered to be quite personal however, unlike diaries, they were maintained to be viewed by others. Many owners went to considerable effort to customise their albums, especially in decorating the covers and often the page borders. These sometimes included heavily stitched sewing, hand coloured dyes and paintings.
Albums have a relevance to folklore because they show us sentiments and much of the verse is what we would classify as traditional. Many are drinking toasts that have found themselves on the paper page. They also tell us something of the changing social times and often make reference to major events (like war) or new inventions (like gas or electricity). Every album strove to be different to reflect its owner’s taste, circumstances and personality.
‘Maggie of Chatswood’s’ album certainly tells us about Maggie and her friends. The album is a wonderful work and contains a wide variety of what I will call ‘album lore’. All the following verse and comments pertain to this one album and its eight-year life.
The most obvious element of change in this diary is the almost abandonment of ‘accepted verse’ (usually florid and sentimental) and the encouragement of originality. This was usually achieved with the poetry being doggerel, from verse to worse.
If on this page you chance to look,
Just think of the writer and shut the book.
The opening page advised the reader of the owner’s intent:
Yes, this is my album,
But learn ere you look,
That you are expected to add to my book;
You are welcome to quiz it,
The penalty is, you add your own ‘auto’
For others to quiz.
Many of the verses were used repeatedly and, one assumes, some contributors simply wrote the same lines in every autograph book they were proffered.
You asked for something original,
I scarcely know where to begin,
For there’s nothing original in me –
Unless it’s original sin.
Understandably expressions of friendship are a major subject.
If scribbling in albums
Friendship endures,
With the greatest of pleasure,
I’ll scribble in yours.
You’ll find it will be best
To meet with smiles the pleasant glance
And think all friends are true,
And never trouble trouble, till trouble troubles you.
Old friends are better than new ones
Old faces are always the best –
But a heart that battles with sorrow,
Is better than all the rest.
Make new friends but keep the old
New ones are silver but old ones are gold.
We live but in the present,
The future is unknown;
Tomorrow is a mystery,
Today is all our own.
The years roll by but friendship does not change.
Witticisms, puns and old chestnuts were popular:
Here’s to the love that lies,
In a woman’s eyes,
And lies, and lies, and lies.
Laugh and the world laughs with you
Weep and you weep alone.
God made man
The man made money
God made bees
The bees made honey
God made the devil
The devil made sin
God made a place
To put the devil in.
Always speak well of the dead.
That’s all very well as it goes,
But why not extend it to those
Who have not yet turned up their toes?
One of the most quoted ancients was Omar Khayyan:
Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring,
The Winter Garment of Repentance fling;
The Bird of Time has but a little way
To fly – and lo! The Bird is on the Wing.
Euripides also got a Guernsey:
Were all certain nothing would be sure
Joy would be joyless of misfortune free
Were we all wealthy then we are all poor
And death not being life would cease to be.
Henry Wodsworth Longfellow also appeared:
Labour with zeal we will,
Something still remains undone,
Something uncompleted still,
Waits the rising of the sun.
Our God a tower of strength is he,
A goodly walls and weapon,
From all our need He helps us free,
That now to us doth happen.
And, of course, ‘anonymous’ was ever present to offer worldly advice:
Straight is the line of duty
Curved is the line of beauty,
Follow the straight and thou shall see
The curved line ever follows thee.
Try to do the little things as if
They were great and important
Try to do the disagreeable things as if
They were pleasant.
Lived in this spirit, life becomes true service.
The above was typed on the page (which must have been difficult) and signed and dated 1915.
Three men went shooting one day –
The blind man saw them,
The man without arms shot them,
The man without clothes put them in his pocket.
The pages of the album were printed in folio sheets of various pastel colours (light browns, greys, blues, greens etc) and some pages had transparent sheets to separate drawings. There were 164 pages in the album (hand numbered by the owner).
This world is full of beauty
As the other world above
And if we did our duty
It might be full of love.
There are many gods,
There are many creeds,
The paths they wind, and wind,
But the one old way,
Of being kind,
Is all this sad world needs.
The wise old crow lived in an oak
The more he heard the less he spoke,
The less he spoke the more he heard,
Why can’t we all be like that bird?
There is no such thing as fighting on the winning side,
One fights to find out which side is the winning side.
Work as though you may live forever,
Live as though you may die today.
Traditional drinking toasts were often used:
Two’s company but they were three,
The Girl, the parlour lamp and He,
Two’s company there’s no doubt,
That’s why the parlour lamp went out.
Here’s to the wings of true love,
May it never lose a feather,
Till your old boots and my old boots
Lay under the bed forever.
Many a shaft at random sent
Finds fully many a mark the archers never meant
And many a word at random spoken
May soothe or wound a heart that’s broken.
Here’s pain to our sham friends
But champagne to our real friends.
Here’s to the man who kisses his wife
And kisses his wife alone,
For there’s many a man kissing
Another man’s wife
When he ought to be kissing his own.
May you live as long as you want to
And never want as long as you live.
Here’s to a long life and a merry one
A quick death and a painless one,
A pretty girl and a loving one,
A cold, cold drink, and a then another one.
There is so much good
In the worst of us.
And so much bad
In the best of us,
That it hardly behoves
Any of us to talk
About the rest of us.
Here’s to the heights of Heaven,
Here’s to the depths of Hell,
Here’s to the girl who can have a good time,
And has sense enough not to tell.
Some verse were personalised to remind ‘Maggie’ of everlasting friendship:
When the summer sun is sinking
And your thoughts from care are free
Of the thousand things you’re thinking
Will you sometimes think of me?
I write this to remind you
In case you forget,
That you still keep your place
In my memory yet.
Longer verse included:
‘Tis not an eye that is never moist
That sees the absurd so often,
‘Tis not the lips that have never voiced
Deep woe that a smile can soften;
But since there are burdens I may not bear,
And brows I have helped to wrinkle,
Be patient reader, and let me share,
In making the red eyes wrinkle.
Boots go on feet; so do men,
Boots have soles; so do men,
Boots sometimes get tight; so do men,
A boot will shine, if polished, so does a man.
Some boots are imitation calf; so are some men.
Boots are tanned; so are men in their youth.
A boot when old gets wrinkled and hard, so does a man.
A boot to be of much account must have a mate; so must a man.
The less understanding there is in a boot the bigger it feels, so it is with a man.
And ‘shorter’ responded with:
Chew me this, chew me that,
And chew me a pound of mutton fat.
A friend in need sis a friend indeed.
And others played on words:
I have never met ‘Miss Wisdom”,
But I have often met misfortune.
The following verse appears to contain the names of several friends as play on words:
Why doesn’t Mabel Love me?
Why doesn’t Phyllis Dare
Why can’t Pauline Chase me?
We’d make a matchless pair.
I cannot Marie Studholme
She’s rich ‘they say’, I’m poor,
Now my trouble’s doubled,
I cannot Carrie Moore.
Some pages were drawn up to allow short contributions inside a border. These included pages with two-inch leaves or squares where a number of people could contribute. Some of these simply had a signature and date. These show how ‘Maggie’ had visited England during the WW1 years with Mr H J Miles noting ‘you left from Kent on the 28th February 1913, for Australia.
There were silly verses too:
Remember me in the river
Remember me in the lake
Remember me on your wedding day
And don’t forget the cake!
It was in a restaurant they met,
Romeo and Juliet.
Rome(owed) what Juli(et).
May your life be as sweet as roses
And your husband as meek as Moses.
One trick in ‘Maggie’s’ album was a turned corner of a page where a lock of Lillian R Robinson’s hair was sewn into the page with a pink thread. The lock was then surrounded with drawn lilacs along with the following verse:
You asked for something original
Something out of my head,
As I haven’t got anything in it,
I’ll give you what’s on it instead!
Another trick involved writing verse or surprise endings upside down.
Two in a hammock
Attempted to kiss,
But all in a moment
(This last line written upside down)
They ended like this!
The following was written upside down:
I’m the girl who ruined your book
By writing upside down.
Circular verse was also used so that the poem was written spirally or in concentric circles. Some carried the following verse:
Round is the ring that hath no end;
So is my love for you, my friend.
Another very popular autograph album trick involved turning down a page corner and writing ‘Strictly Private – for ladies only’. When turned over the page reads ‘Sticky Beak!’
It was not uncommon for autograph albums to contain pressed flowers and petals. Rose and poppy petals were the most popular. Sometimes these petals were given an extra boost with scent.
On this leaf, in memory pressed,
May my name forever rest.
Several pages in the book offered hand drawn, pencil and charcoal, illustrations. There were also wash and oil paintings. Obviously this meant lending the album to friends so they could render the work. Once again, this removes the album from the realm of diaries, which, understandably, were hardly ever given to friends to read.
This drawing, with charcoal, shows the steamship ‘Lusitania’ sinking. The inscription reads ‘When I think of the ‘Lusitania’ I will always think of you’ (1915). I’m sure this was not a bawdy reference to our dear ‘Maggie’ ‘going down’??
One pencil drawing rang the bell of the changeover from horse-drawn transport to the new era of the motor vehicle. It depicted the old tale of the Tortoise and Hare but this time it was the sulky and T Model Ford.
The following pencil drawing carried the caption:
Captain of ship to new sailor who had been sent up aloft and fallen on the deck with a crash: “Well, my man, and where did you come from?”
The reply: “From the north of Oirland, sir.” (Ireland)
Bawdy verse were included but they were appropriately tame:
Mary had a little lamb, which was always full of fun,
And every time she stroked its head it murmured, “you’re the one.”
In contrast the Reverend S, M. Baker of St Peter’s Rectory offered:
God has His best things for the few,
That dares to stand the test;
God has His second best for those
Who will not have the best.
Limericks were also included. This one, titled ‘Ingenious Young Stubble’, appeared with a pencil-drawn illustration of the ‘young Stubble’ in his motor vehicle selling soap. One assumes the word ‘auto’ was a play on the autograph and automobile.
A handy young fellow named Stubble,
Made an ‘auto’ without any trouble.
He went ’round selling soap,
And he murmured, ‘I hope,
I can patent my little soap ‘bubble’
There was a young man of Perth,
Who was born on the day of his birth,
He was married they say
On his wife’s wedding day,
And died his last day on earth.
Conundrums were also popular:
Be thou my star in reason’s night,
Be thou my rock, in danger’s fright,
Be thou my guide ‘mid passion’s sway;
My moon by night, my sun by day.
Who is it?
Answer?
And so too the ‘battle of the sexes’:
She’s a right to be saucy, a right to be smart,
But she hasn’t any right ti break a man’s heart;
To the ‘breaches of promise’ she has every claim,
But ‘wearing the breeches’ is a far different game.
Then there was the ‘art of the autograph’:
Some write for fortune,
Some write for fame,
But I write simply to –
Sign my name.
This little book is like a cabbage patch
Where every little hen must have a scratch –
And so must I.
May each page of your album be brightened
By the grace that a friend’s hand will lend
And each day of your life’s journey be brightened
By the touch of the hand of a friend.
Without a doubt the prized position in any autograph album was the very back page:
I’ve read these pages over and over
To see what others have written before
And in this quiet little spot
I write the words ‘forget me not’
Back here just bout of spite
These two lines do I indite.
By hook or by crook
I’ll be the last in your book!
By the 1950s autograph albums witnessed a dramatic change. It was still common to collect sentiments and autographs of friends but it was more important to collect signatures of ‘celebrities’ Young girls appeared obsessed with pursuing celebrities, even minor known celebrities, for their autograph. This coincided with the launch of television and an entertainment that put faces to many stars. It was also the birth of rock and roll and a newfound freedom that allowed young women to ‘hunt’ stars. I remember the old Sydney Stadium (Rushcutter’s Bay) when it was the venue for the first ‘big shows’ presented by impresario Lee Gordon. Thousands of young girls, and some not so young, waited at the stage doors screaming, crying and desperately waving their autograph books at Johnny Ray, Crash Craddock Johnny O’Keefe and other ‘stars’ of the time. Time has seen many of these signatures become real collector’s items worth considerable dollars.
The past fifty years has seen Australians, like most of the world, become celebrity obsessed to the point where entire television channels (E Television) and magazines (Who, National Enquirer etc) are pumped out weekly to satisfy the seemingly insatiable market. Anyone want to trade a Paris Hilton for a Don Bradman signature?
I’ll leave the last word to ‘Maggie’
If on this page you chance to look
Just think of the writer and shut the book.