What does "hempie" mean?

A criminal; someone who deserves to be, or is likely to be, hanged.

Hempie

Common synonyms include: crack-hemp, criminal and thesaurus:gallows bird, gallows bird, hangdog, hangworthy, troublemaker.

adj, noun

adj, noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Noun

1
A criminal; someone who deserves to be, or is likely to be, hanged. Northern-England, Scotland, obsolete
2
A rogue. Northern-England, Scotland, obsolete
"'Ha, ha, Patie lad!' quo Bessie Elliot, a free-spoken Liddesdale hempy, 'there's a wife com'd for ye the night, Patie lad.'"
3
A wild, romping girl. Northern-England, Scotland, obsolete
"“Ay, ay,” answered Rob, “she's under lawfu' authority now; and full time, for she was a daft hempie[…]”"

Adjective

1
Deserving of being hanged. Northern-England, Scotland, obsolete
2
Wild; riotous; mischievous. Northern-England, Scotland, obsolete
"The forst one's just as prood as us, / Te see his bonny mate, / An' if thor spared te grow up lads, / They'll fettle real forst-rate; / But if like hempy lads they ﬁght, / We'll heh to keep them doon, / An’ try te myek them byeth as gud / As ony in the toon."

"'Ha, ha, Patie lad!' quo Bessie Elliot, a free-spoken Liddesdale hempy, 'there's a wife com'd for ye the night, Patie lad.'"

From hemp + -ie.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.