blackfriars
A piece of old London thieves' cant meaning 'look out' or 'beware' — part of the coded vocabulary that criminals and street hustlers used to tip each other off about danger, typically the approach of police or other threats.
Seen in the wild
In 1539 it was surrendered to Henry VIII - the 12 friars dispersed and much of the complex was demolished, apart from the Blackfriars site we see today.. Crucially, when the Dominicans returned 3 centuries later, they…
The Dominican Order (ie, the Blackfriars!) arrived in Newcastle in 1239 (or thereabouts). Land was donated by 3 sisters and funds were raised by one of the first Mayors Peter Scot. This was the first friary in the tow…
Definitions
A piece of old London thieves' cant meaning 'look out' or 'beware' — part of the coded vocabulary that criminals and street hustlers used to tip each other off about danger, typically the approach of police or other threats. Like much Victorian-era thieves' slang, it borrowed place names and ordinary words and repurposed them as warning signals. Today it reads as a historical curiosity, a window into the rich underground argot of 19th-century London.
One word of blackfriars from the lookout sent the whole crew scattering into the alleyways.
Comments
(obsolete, UK, thieves) look out; beware.
“In 1539 it was surrendered to Henry VIII - the 12 friars dispersed and much of the complex was demolished, apart from the Blackfriars site we see today.. Crucially, when the Dominicans returned 3 centuries later, they didn't return to the old medieval house.”
— Bluesky· May 2026“The Dominican Order (ie, the Blackfriars!) arrived in Newcastle in 1239 (or thereabouts). Land was donated by 3 sisters and funds were raised by one of the first Mayors Peter Scot. This was the first friary in the town, extending down between Low Friar St and Corporation St”
— Bluesky· May 2026
Comments
Used in
Have a better definition?
Add your own interpretation of "blackfriars".
🇬🇧About British & Irish slang slang
UK and Irish slang — Cockney, Scouse, Geordie, Yorkshire, Glaswegian, Brummie, Welsh, West Country, plus Irish English. Centuries of regional dialects feeding into modern British and Irish street talk.
See all British & Irish slang slang on Slangora.
Tags
Other words near "blackfriars" (B)
Browse all slang words starting with B.
Related terms
People also read
Semantically related
- namous61%
(obsolete, UK, thieves' cant) Look out! Beware!.
- darkmans60%
Obsolete English thieves' cant for nighttime or 'the night', used by 16th and 17th century criminal underworld communities to refer to the dark hours when illicit activity was most easily conducted. Part of a rich vocabulary of Elizabethan and Jacobean criminal slang documented in canting dictionaries of the period. 'Darkmans' pairs with 'lightmans' (daytime). Today the word is of purely historical and literary interest, appearing in period crime fiction, academic study of cant, and occasionally in fantasy or historical RPG settings.
- black as Newgate's knocker58%
A vivid British simile meaning completely, utterly black — as dark as the famous iron knocker on the gate of Newgate Prison, London's most notorious jail. The phrase dates back centuries and trades on Newgate's grim reputation: everything associated with it was dark, forbidding, and heavy. Used to describe anything from overcast skies to scorched toast to a blackened cooking pot, it has the dour wit characteristic of working-class London speech, and still pops up in older British writing and regional dialogue.
- nap the regulars57%
Obsolete British criminal slang from the thieves' cant tradition, meaning to divide the stolen loot among the members of a criminal crew. Nap here means to take or seize, and regulars refers to the established shares owed to each person. Thieves' cant was a deliberate secret language used by criminals, beggars, and traveling people in 17th–19th century Britain to talk openly without being understood by outsiders.