dicky

See also: Dicky

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈdɪki/

• Audio (Australia):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪki

Etymology 1

From Dicky, pet form of Richard.

• In cover/apron senses: perhaps from English dialect dick (“leather apron”) +‎ -y; perhaps from Dutch dek (“a cover”).

Alternative forms

• dickey, dickie

Noun

dicky (plural dickies)

1. (colloquial) A louse.
2. (Cockney rhyming slang) Dicky dirt = a shirt, meaning a shirt with a collar.
3. (slang) A detachable shirt front, collar or bib.

   Synonym: tommy

4. (slang, dated) A hat, especially (in the US) a stiff hat or derby, and (in the UK) a straw hat.
5. (dated) A seat behind a carriage or early motor car, for a servant.
   • 1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Romance and Reality. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, pages 134–135:

     ...and she was just in time to see Mr. Boyne Sillery hand her aunt into a carriage, jump in himself, when it drove off with a rapidity which scarcely allowed her to observe that a large imperial was on the top, and her aunt's servant, with a huge bandbox, on the dickey.

6. (dated) A seat in a carriage, for the driver.
7. (South Asia) The luggage storage compartment of a sedan/saloon style car.

   Synonyms: (UK, Australia) boot, (Canada, US) trunk

   Can you open the dicky for me?

   • 1988, Bapsi Sidhwa, Ice-Candy Man, Daunt Books (2016), page 184:

     Back and forth, back and forth, go our mothers on their secret missions, carrying their sinister freight in the dicky of our Morris Minor.

8. (India, colloquial) the buttocks.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:buttocks

9. (historical) A leather apron for a gig, etc.
10. A small bird; a dicky-bird.
11. (idiomatic, UK, in negative constructions) An insignificant sound or thing; dicky-bird.
    • 2013, Michael Dobbs, A Ghost at the Door:

      Oh, she landed at Heathrow all right, like you said, but since then your Miss Ranelagh seems to have vanished as effectively as my overdue promotion. Not used her credit card, her Internet account, her mobile phone. Nothing. Not a dicky.

12. (UK, military slang) A pilot.
13. (UK, dialect) A hedge sparrow.
14. (UK, dialect) A donkey.
    • 1896, Augustus Jessopp, Random Roaming, and Other Papers, page 181:

      I've heard grandfather say that when Mr. Priest was at his best there was scores o' young gents as used to come to school as day-boys, 'cause there was no room for 'em to board; and they used to come on dickies […]

15. A haddock.

Derived terms

• dicky-bird
• dicky bow

Descendants

• → Urdu: ڈِکّی (ḍikkī), ڈِگّی (ḍiggī)
  • → Pashto: ډِګّۍ (ḍiggay)

Translations

seat behind a carriage or early motor car, for a servant

• Irish: cúlóg f

Etymology 2

Unknown. Perhaps a use of Dicky, hypocoristic form of Dick, perhaps playing on its resemblance to tricky, sticky, or other similar-sounding words. Alternatively, perhaps an alteration of dickens.

Alternative forms

• dickey

Adjective

dicky (comparative dickier, superlative dickiest)

1. (colloquial) In bad condition; weak, faulty, unreliable, doubtful, troublesome.

   He had a dicky heart.

   I've got a dicky tummy.

   • 1867, Edmund Yates, Broken to Harness: A Story of English Domestic Life, page 311:

     Ribald boys stuck the red-covered books of domestic household expenditure which they carried into their breasts, and swaggered by with heads erect; others openly expressed their opinion that it was “all dicky” with him; […]

Etymology 3

From dick +‎ -y (diminutive suffix), apparently originally punningly after Etymology 1.

Noun

dicky (plural dickies)

1. (vulgar, slang) A penis (dick).

Etymology 4

Etymology tree

English dick

Proto-Indo-European *-kos

Proto-Germanic *-gaz

Proto-West Germanic *-g

Old English -iġ

Middle English -y

English -y

English dicky

From dick + -y (adjectival suffix).

Adjective

dicky (comparative dickier, superlative dickiest)

1. (informal, vulgar) Like a dick, foolish or obnoxious.

See also

• dicky up

Anagrams

• ICYDK