by Gordon
30. October 2009 08:32
We get a lot of questions about TV series which feature Cockney slang. The top two are:
Minder
Only Fools and Horses
The Sweeney
Because these series are repeated continuously all round the world, they pick up fans in the strangest places who are often baffled by the Cockney lingo. For example we have a fan of Only Fools and Horses who writes to us from Alabama quite regularly to decipher DelBoy's sayings.
Anyway, Jack wrote to us recently with this question about the prhase "Peter", meaning a safe or vault, from The Sweeney:
"I bought the box set of 'The Sweeney' recently and am slowly working my way through them all. Twice in the episode 'Stay Lucky Eh?' they used the slang 'peter' to refer to a safe (or possibly, 'vault') that was broken into. This was a bit confusing as one of the main characters was also called Peter! Anyway, I cannot find a translation for this anywhere online and feel sure that it must be rhymning slang as the show used it extensively. Can you help? Thanks!"
With a bit of help from Eric and Google, we came up with this:
There's no doubt that Peter does mean a safe. It used to be such a common phrase that is was not considered slang - "peter" was simply the word for a
safe or trunk.
The origins are unclear. There is speculation that it could come from the Biblical Peter - either because safes were frequently netted by thieves (placed in a net a hauled away) or because Peter is the Greek word for rock, and the safes were supposed to be rock solid.
St Peter was called "the rock" by Jesus, and the rock upon which Christianity was built. What's more, St Peter is supposed to hold the keys to kingdom of heaven - St Peter the keeper adds credibility to the theory that Peter for "safe" is derived from St Peter.
It dates from the 1600s but was in common usage during the 20th Century.
If you have any more info let us know.