From: "Old Goat" <olgoat-AT-nebi.com>
Subject: Re: Irish Travellers...
Date: Sat, 5 Oct 2002 22:41:59 -0500


>From "Partridge's Concise Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English":

pike.   To indulge in sharp practice; to cheat

piker.  [One who] habitually takes more than [one's] share....A confidence
trickster

piking.  'Sharp practice'


old goat
withdraw consent
----- Original Message -----
From: ninetyone andy
To: dan combs
Cc: Old Goat ; anarchy list
Sent: Saturday, October 05, 2002 13:35
Subject: Re: Irish Travellers...


I looked it up in some dictionaries of slang and
carp's one was there.

Piker was also described as someone who tries to avoid
work by disappearing, possibly picking up a pike-staff
before setting out.

It was also as pikey and carp's piker linked to toll
roads and turn-pikes in another dictionary, which said
it was a name for travellers common in the UK in the
1950s particularly used in Kent for the hop-pickers.
There was a suggestion that there was a dialect verb
'pike' meaning to travel. Anyway, the travellers who
went into Kent for hop-picking would quite likely have
been in Surrey and Middlesex on their way out again,
so I guess pikey has lasted.

Neither dictionary listed it as an abusive term
though.

Andy



 --- dan combs <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us> wrote: > On
Fri, 4 Oct 2002, ninetyone andy wrote:
>
> >
> > > Pikey eh?  Do you know the derivation on that?
> >
> > I don't - it'll be my task for the weekend.
>
> My guess?
>
>
> piker   Pronunciation Key  (pkr)
> n. Slang
> A cautious gambler.
> A person regarded as petty or stingy.
>
> Or a person who wirks or travels along a pike
> (road).
>
>
> carpo
>

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