cleanskin

WOTD – 26 May 2011

English

Etymology

From .

Noun

cleanskin (plural cleanskins)

1. Template:Australia An unbranded animal.
   • 1921, Joseph Furphy, Rigby′s Romance, Gutenberg Australia eBook #0607461h,

     No one had any clear notion of how many head might be collected, but we counted on something over four hundred--possibly up to five hundred and fifty, including calves and cleanskins.

   • 1988, Tom Cole, Hell West and Crooked:

     I started off lassoing the cleanskins, dragging them up bellowing to the bronco panel where they were quickly leg-roped, thrown and branded.

   • 1995, Darrell Lewis & Charles Schultz, Beyond the Big Run, p. 96:

     The bullocks would be in the lead and you'd whip in and let the bullocks go to hell, but hang to your cleanskins as much as you could.

2. Someone with no prior criminal record, a person with no previous convictions; loosely, someone who has not done anything wrong before, an unblemished character.
   • 2007, Poul Anderson, Shocking Australian True Crime Stories, page 169,

     Ryan′s natural father was a cleanskin – a police term for a person with no criminal history – who found himself caught up in the world of career criminals when he married into The Clan.

   • 2010, Gaby Hinsliff, The Guardian, 19 Apr 2010:

     So the only strategy likely to hurt Clegg in those circumstances involves arguing that the Lib Dems are part of the mould too – not cleanskins, but a party with 60-plus MPs in that last discredited parliament.

3. Template:Australia An unlabelled bottle of wine.
   • 2010, Teresa Ooi, The Australian, 16 Apr 2010:

     Mr McKenzie said that two years ago a decent bottle of sauvignon blanc sold for $15 to $20, but today prices were down to $10 a bottle. "More cleanskins entering the market is the first indication there is too much SB out there," he said.

   • 2010, Terry Lee Stone, Managing the Design Process Implementing Design: An Essential Manual for the Working Designer, page 47,

     In 2009, Back Label commissioned Voice to design a label for its cleanskin.

   • 2011, Craig Sherborne, The Amateur Science of Love, p. 64:

     My eye-whites still woke up bright and clear despite the night before's two bottles of cheap cleanskin wine.

4. An undercover police officer who has not done a particular task before.
5. Template:cricket A cricket bat with no maker's logo

Translations

an unbranded animal

• Russian: неклеймёное животное (neklejmjónoje životnoje)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}

someone with no prior criminal record, a person with no previous convictions

• Russian: (informal) чистый (čistyj)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}