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come the raw prawn

verb

Etymology

From World War II military slang. Construction obscure; suggestions are: * From come (“act the part of”) + the + raw (“naive”) + prawn (“(slang) fool”) — thus, to attempt to deceive by feigning ignorance. * From come (“(putatively) perpetrate”) + the + raw prawn = something hard to swallow.

Definitions

  1. To attempt to deceive or impose upon (someone).

    • 1951, Dymphna Cusack, Florence James, 1957, Come In Spinner, page 306, “ […] Coupla bastards come the raw prawn over me on the last lap up from Melbourne and I done me last bob at Swy.”
    • "Don't come the raw prawn! I only gave her a bit of a smack on the chops, we didn't get around to the fair dinkum article!
    • Come on, Dimitri, don't come the raw prawn love! Four quid's the price.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for come the raw prawn. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA