Peter? a safe? in the Sweeney

[R1Geezer]

Now I'm usually on the ball with Rhymming slang but I cannot see how "peter" is the word for a safe, anyone explain? thanks

[mccfluff]

bet you didn't expect this R1!

anyway found this

http://www.phespirit.info/cockney/slang_to_eng lish.htm

[Quizmonster]

Ah! So you could find some confirmation that there are others who use can to mean safe, Mcc! Well done. That's all I asked you for, you know.

[chadad]

Fair comment Quizmonster. But the original question did ask for the Rhyming slang definition, and not for the Olde English definition.
Anyway, Can anyone come up with a different word that coupled with " Peter ", could designate a safe.
" Peter Strongbox " doesn't have quite the same ring.
And What's life without the occasional nitpick?

[chadad]

Just to keep stirring things up.
Would the pre-cockney term " Peter " have anything to do with " Petard ". = A mine or exploding device ?

[Quizmonster]

Talking of 'different words', Chadad, I was just thinking how times had changed. After quite stirring words such as peterman, safe-cracker and safe-blower, what do we have nowadays...a can-opener!? A modern-day criminal's equally-criminal great-grandad would be horrified!

Petard came from the same source as the modern French word, p�ter, meaning to fart. The connection is obviously with the idea of 'blowing'! It first appeared in English in the very late 1500s. As peter, meaning trunk/portmanteau first emerged in the early 1600s, it seems unlikely that they are related.

[ladyalex]

So you don't think much of my saltpetre idea, then ?

[Quizmonster]

I'm not sure whether you're addressing me, Ladyalex, but if so...no I don't, I'm afraid. Certainly petermen (one word) were safe-crackers and so called from about 1900, but they got the name purely because safes were called peters by then, as I outlined earlier, and not for any connection with saltpetre.
Petre men (as two separate words), has existed in English since the 16th century, but - according to The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) - it meant only producers of saltpetre, not users and certainly not specifically for blowing safes.
One really can't just dismiss what the word-bible, the OED, has to say about word-origins and it says nothing at all about any connection between saltpetre and peter = safe. We can safely take it as read, therefore, that there is no such connection. Sorry!

[ladyalex]

Thanks, quizmonster.
I'm sure you are correct.
Another apocryphal story gone!
:-))

[chadad]

Following up on Quizmonster's dismay at an old cracksman's horror on hearing a safe described as a mere "Can ".
How about my old regiment, whose march was " The Gay Hussar "?

[mccfluff]

and also QM you said that you may be scottish but can't play the bagpipes however my londoner responded with he is a londoner and use's the 'queen's english' on a daily basis. which does go a long way to explaining why i have no idea what the hell he is talking about most of the time :-)

[Quizmonster]

Mcc, my point about the bagpipes was just meant to illustrate the fact that using a language is no evidence that one actually knows a single thing about the mechanics or history of that language.
We find this sort of thing everywhere. For example, when people - simply on the basis that they went to school - imagine they know what the process of education or the skills involved in teaching/learning are all about. They don't.
My main problem here was the fact that The Oxford English Dictionary lists thirteen meanings for the noun, can, including slang ones such as prison, toilet etc. Not one of the remaining eleven says anything about safes. So, not only had I never heard it thus used, but I could find no reference to it in that or any other dictionary.
The website you provided a link to was, at least, evidence that can = safe wasn't just something used in your boyfriend's street!
I actually maintain a little encyclop�dia of my own for recurring questions such as this one, so that I can just cut and paste replies. I shall certainly add your information to the relevant entry for future use, so thank you for that, ma'am. Cheers

[chadad]

So, as they say in Holywood, " It's in the can ".

[fredpuli47]

I was told, many years ago, by an old London policeman that the reference is to Saint Peter (but nothing to do with a rock).. Saint Peter was unjustly cast into prison on the orders of Herod Agrippa when Herod was persecuting Christians.He was freed by an angel who miraculously appeared.(Acts chapter 12 ]

As you can imagine, this image appealed to the sense of humour of London's criminal community, each of whom fancied that they'd been wrongly imprisoned but might only escape by divine intervention! No doubt this story was familiar to them from their being given improving and forced church sermons in jail, if not from elsewhere.Anyway, each hoped he was in Peter's cell, as it were.

[fredpuli47]

Perhaps I should add that old 'Cockney' criminals who I met would use 'peter' exclusively for cell. They'd say 'Put me back in the peter' meaning 'Back in the cell'. The use of peter for a safe was certainly not common; I didn't hear it used once in thirty years of dealing with such people, but I did read it in fiction where 'peterman' was a safe blower; ( maybe it was used locally in some other part of London or had died out before)

[Smithy09]

Agree with the link in the first answer. It's biblical, referring to St Peter - the bible says Jesus gave the keys to heaven to St Peter. Hence "Peter" refers to any lock or safe. Many statues and paintings of St Peter show him holding keys and the pope's coat of arms show the keys too.

[bobtcharles]

Had to add something to this thread. A Peterman has nothing (or little) to do with the word Peter as associated with the word safe in cockey slang. A Peterman is someone who uses explosives, and comes from their use of saltpetre. They are still called that in some mining towns in my native Australia.

[FeatheredFish]

"Robbing Peter to pay Paul" would make perfect sense and context for the origin of a safe being referred to as a "Peter."

[Ian-Wallace]

I looked on here as this is the sort of question my friends think I can answer - and I could not.
By far the most plausible origin is from the early use of peter for a safe or a safe box. This phrase was already old fashioned when I first came across it in the mid 1950s.
I agree that a lot of words have their origin in rhyming slang (I had used "butchers" for years before I realised it came from "butchers hook" - and my mother and grandparents were Cockney) but in this case the chronology argues against this.

[DAPVRBM]

the term is derived from cockney slang!Gas meter [PETER]a box full of[COINS] money A SAFE CRACKER OPENS HOPEFULLY A METAL BOX[THE PETER] FULL OF MONEY,HOPE THIS CLEARS IT UP...

[DAPVRBM]

tHE TERM IS FROM COCKNEY RHYMING SLANG. FOR A GAS METER FULL OF COINS[MONEY]GAS METER[A PETER/] SAFECRACKER OPENING A METAL BOX[AS IN METER]FULL OF MONEY SO LET THIS BE AN END OF IT...