sheeny

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃiːni/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːni

Etymology 1

Unknown.

Alternative forms

• sheeney, sheenie

Noun

sheeny (plural sheenies)

1. (slang, offensive, ethnic slur) A Jew.

   Synonyms: (not always pejorative) Yid, heeb, Hymie, kike, shylock

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

     Shylock chimes with the jewbaiting that followed the hanging and quartering of the queen’s leech Lopez, his jew’s heart being plucked forth while the sheeny was yet alive.

   • 1925 July – 1926 May, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “(please specify the chapter number)”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019:

     "I've told you before now not to push that long, sheeny beak of yours into my affairs."

   • 1946, Milton “Mezz” Mezzrow, Bernard Wolfe, “Don’t Cry, Ma”, in Really the Blues, New York, N.Y.: Random House, book 1 (1899–1923: A Nothin’ but a Child), page 6:

     One time in Humboldt Park Leo "Bow" Gisensohn, our leader, didn't like the way a cop down by the lake called him "sheeny."

   • 2005, “Creed, OK”, in Carnivàle, episode 17:

     Max Baer ain't no Jew.
     Sure he is. Everybody knows that. Sheeny to the core.

2. (slang) A cheat or fraudster.

Translations

a Jew (slur)

• Esperanto: judaĉo
• French: youde m, youpin (fr) m
• Russian: жи́д (ru) m (žíd)

Etymology 2

From sheen +‎ -y.

Adjective

sheeny (comparative sheenier, superlative sheeniest)

1. Having a sheen; glossy.
2. Bright; radiant; shining.
   • 1830 June, Alfred Tennyson, “Recollections of the Arabian Nights”, in Poems. […], volume I, London: Edward Moxon, […], published 1842, →OCLC, part I, page 22:

     And many a sheeny summer-morn, / Adown the Tigris I was borne, / By Bagdat's shrines of fretted gold, / High-walled gardens green and old; […]

Translations

Having a sheen; glossy

• Bulgarian: лъскав (bg) (lǎskav)
• Czech: lesklý (cs)

Anagrams

• Heynes, Heyens, yen she