Perisher

name, noun, slang

name, noun, slang ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    An annoying child, a brat. British, informal

    "Get off my lawn, you little perisher!"

  2. 2
    bounder wordnet
  3. 3
    One who perishes. rare

    "The Perishers Various peoples have perished in the past - for instance, Neanderthal Man and, later, the Tasmanians. Others are in the process of perishing - the aboriginees of Australia, the Bushmen, the Ituri Pygmies and the Red Indians."

  4. 4
    An extreme act; a case of going all in. Australia, British, obsolete

    "'So I've come down to Coltonslough, being, as I understand, the dullest hole upon the earth's crust, and I mean to go in a perisher.' A 'perisher' was his expression. 'And I mean to read like old boots; so you may let your servant light me a fire, ...'"

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    The Submarine Command Course. UK, slang

Example

More examples

"Get off my lawn, you little perisher!"

Etymology

Etymology 1

From perish + -er.

Etymology 2

A pun on periscope and perish, in allusion to the supposedly low pass rate.

Related phrases

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