verb (old cant: now recognised).—1. To steal: specifically to pilfer in small ways [DEKKER: from the ‘filches’ or hooks used by thieves in stealing out of open windows; SKEAT: for filk from O.E. fele, Icel. fela, to steal, like talk and tell, stalk (verb) and steal where k is a formative element.—See Transactions of the Philological Society, 1865, p. 188.] For synonyms, see PRIG. FILCH, properly FILCHMAN (q.v.) = a hooked staff; ON THE FILCH or FILCHING = stealing.
1567. HARMAN, A Caveat or Warening for Common Cursetors (1814), p. 66. To FYLCHE, to robbe.
1580. TUSSER, Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie, ch. 63, st. 13, p. 143 (E.D.S.).
| The champion robbeth by night, | |
| and prowleth and FILCHETH by day. |
1611. MIDDLETON, The Roaring Girle, Act iv., Sc. 1.
| What she leaves | |
| Thou shalt come closely in and FILCH away. |
1729. SWIFT, Intelligencer, No. 4, p. 35 (2nd ed.). The servants having all that time to themselves to intrigue, to junket, to FILCH and steal.
1830. MARRYAT, The King’s Own, ch. x. I could FILCH a handkerchief as soon as I was high enough to reach a pocket, and was declared to be a most promising child.
1877. W. H. THOMSON, Five Years’ Penal Servitude, iii. 246. She were an out and outer in going into shops on the FILCH.
1610. ROWLANDS, Martin Mark-all, p. 38 [Hunterian Club’s Reprint, 1874], s.v.
Subs. (old).—A thief. [From the verb.] Also FILCHER (q.v.). For synonyms, see AREA-SNEAK.
1811. POOLE, Hamlet Travestie, ii., 3.
| A very FILCH, that more deserves to hang, | |
| Than any one of the light-finger’d gang. |
