cheese it
English
Etymology
Unknown, but lexicographer Eric Partridge (1894-1976) speculated that it may be a corruption of cease.
In his Vocabulary of the Flash Language, author and former convict James Hardy Vaux (1782-?) defined cheese it as synonymous with stash it and stow it, all meaning to desist or leave off.
Phrase
- (idiomatic, slang) An imperative used as a warning to stop, hide, or flee
- 1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter VIII:
- And so it came about that some five minutes later I stood once more outside the Blue Room with Bobbie beside me, not actually at the moment singing in the wilderness but prepared so to sing if Ma Cream, modelling her strategy on that of the Assyrian, came down like a wolf on the fold. The nervous system was a bit below par, of course, but not nearly so much so as it might have been. Knowing that Bobbie would be on sentry-go made all the difference. Any gangster will tell you that the strain and anxiety of busting a safe are greatly diminished if you've a look-out man ready at any moment to say “Cheese it, the cops!”
- 1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter VIII:
Translations
a warning to stop, hide, or flee
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