Tosh

Pronunciation

• IPA: /tɒʃ/
• Rhymes: -ɒʃ

From 19th-century British thieves cant, of uncertain origin. Sense of nonsense possibly influenced by tush ("nonsense! tsk tsk!") attested from 15th century.

Alternative forms

• (nonsense) tush

Full definition of tosh

Noun

1. (British, obsolete slang, uncountable) Copper; items made of copper
• 1851, H. Mayhew, London labour and the London poor, II. 150/2The sewer-hunters were formerly, and indeed are still, called by the name of Toshers, the articles which they pick up in the course of their wanderings along shore being known among themselves by the general term ‘tosh’, a word more particularly applied by them to anything made of copper.
2. (chiefly British, uncommon slang, uncountable) Valuables retrieved from sewers and drains
• 1974, J. Aiken, Midnight is Place, v. 164I am present engaged in fishing for tosh in the sewers of Blastburn.
3. (chiefly British, slang, uncountable) Rubbish, trash, (now) especially in the sense of nonsense, bosh, balderdash
• 1892 October 26, Oxford University Magazine, 26/1To think what I've gone through to hear that man! Frightful tosh it'll be, too.
• 1911, H. G. Wells, The New Machiavelli, ch. 5,Perhaps it helped a man into Parliament, Parliament still being a confused retrogressive corner in the world where lawyers and suchlike sheltered themselves from the onslaughts of common-sense behind a fog of Latin and Greek and twaddle and tosh.
4. 1997, J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, iv
5. ‘Took yeh from the ruined house myself, on Dumbledore’s orders. Brought yeh ter this lot...’‘Load of old tosh,’ said Uncle Vernon.
6. (UK, archaic school slang, countable) A bath or foot pan
• 1881, Leathes in C.E. Pascoe, Everyday Life in our Public Schools, ii. 20A ‘tosh’ pan... is also provided.
• 1905, H. A. Vachell, Hill, iWe call a tub a tosh.
7. (cricket, slang, disparaging, uncountable) Easy bowling
• 1898 June 25, Tit-Bits, 252/3Among the recent neologisms of the cricket field is ‘tosh’, which means bowling of contemptible easiness.
8. (UK, jocular slang, uncountable) Used as a form of address.
• 1954, E. Hyams, Stories & Cream, 175'Ere, tosh, you bin at Cha'ham?

Derived terms

• toshy, toshing

Synonyms

• See

Verb

1. (British, obsolete slang) To steal copper, particularly from ship hulls
• 1867, W. H. Smyth, Sailor's Word-book
• Toshing, a cant word for stealing copper sheathing from vessels' bottoms, or from dock-yard stores.
2. (chiefly British, uncommon slang) To search for valuables in sewers
• 1974, J. Aiken, ''Midnight is Place vi. 180 You tend to the toshing, let Mester Hobday tend to the dealing.
3. (UK, archaic school slang) To use a tosh-pan, either to wash, to splash, or to "bath"
• 1883, J.P. Groves, From Cadet to Captain, iii. 227‘Toshing’ was the name given to a punishment inflicted by the cadets on any one of their number who made himself obnoxious. The victim, dressed in full uniform, was forced to run the gauntlet of his brother cadets, who, as he passed, emptied the contents of their ‘tosh-cans’ (small baths holding about three gallons of water) over the wretched lad's head.
• 1903, J. S. Farmer & al., Slang, VII. 171/1He toshed his house beak by mistake, and got three hundred.

Compare Old French tonce ("shorn, clipped") and English tonsure.

Adjective

1. (Scotland, obsolete) Tight.
• 1776, D. Herd, Ancient & Modern Scottish SongsTosh, tight, neat.
2. (Scotland) Neat, clean; tidy, trim.
• 1794, J. Ritson, Scottish Songs, I. 99I gang ay fou clean and fou toshAs a' the neighbours can tell.
3. (Scotland) Comfortable, agreeable; friendly, intimate.
• 1821, Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 10 4We were a very tosh and agreeable company.

Derived terms

• toshy, toshly

Adverb

1. (Scotland) Toshly: neatly, tidily
• 1808, J. Mayne, Siller Gun, i. 20Shouther your arms!—O! had them tosh on, And not athraw!

Verb

1. (Scotland) To make ‘tosh’: to tidy, to trim.
• 1826 November, J. Wilson, Noctes Ambrosianae, xxix, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 788Hoo she wad try to tosh up... her breest.

From 19th-century British slang tosheroon, from or alongside tusheroon, of uncertain derivation from British slang caroon ("crown, a 5-shilling silver coin"), from Sabir and (originally) Italian corona ("crown"). The term was either derived from or influenced by madza caroon, the British slang for the Sabir and Italian mezzo corona ("half-crown"), possibly under influence from tosh ("copper items; valuables") above or from the half-crown's value of two shillings, sixpence.

Alternative forms

• tush

Noun

1. (British, obsolete slang, countable) A half-crown coin; its value
• 1933, George Orwell, Down and Out in Paris and London, xxix‘’Ere y’are, the best rig-out you ever ’ad. A tosheroon a crown for the coat, two ’ogs for the trousers, one and a tanner for the boots, and a ’og for the cap and scarf. That’s seven bob.’
• 1961, Eric Partridge, The Routledge Dictionary of Historical Slangtush or tosh. Money: Cockney: late C.19–20. Ex: tusheroon... But John Camden Hotten errs, I believe: he should mean half-a-crown, for tusheroon and its C.20 variant tossaroon (2s. 6d.) are manifest corruptions of Lingua Franca MADZA CAROON.
2. 1961, J. Maclaren-Ross, Doomsday Book, i. v. 63
3. Here's a tosh to buy yourself some beer.
4. (British, obsolete slang, countable) A crown coin; its value
• 1859, J.C. Hotten, A Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant, and Vulgar WordsHalf-a-crown is known as an alderman, half a bull, half a tusheroon, and a madza caroon; whilst a crown piece, or five shillings, may be called either a bull, or a caroon, or a cartwheel, or a coachwheel, or a thick-un, or a tusheroon.
• 1912, J.W. Horsley, I Remember, xii. 253‘Tush’, for money, would be an abbreviation of ‘tusheroon’, which in old cant, and also in tinker dialect, signified a crown.
5. (British, archaic slang, uncountable) Any money, particularly pre-decimalization British coinage

Anagrams

• host
• hots
• shot
• Thos.