a merchant banker

Guest   Fri Sep 01, 2006 2:58 pm GMT
What does it mean in Cockney slang?
j   Fri Sep 01, 2006 8:37 pm GMT
I don't know about 'Cockney slang', bit here is an article from Urban Dictionary:
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=merchant+banker
Guest   Fri Sep 01, 2006 11:46 pm GMT
Change b to w in the second word and you'll know.
j   Sat Sep 02, 2006 6:52 am GMT
That's exactly what the article from the Urban Dictionary tells.
Damian in East Finchley N   Sat Sep 02, 2006 12:00 pm GMT
'Ey mite.....vat guy aouvuh there...'e's a roi' merchant bankah!
(Current London type street wise accent)

Translation:
Hey, mate.....that guy over there....he's a right wanker.

Originally London, now UK nationwide rhyming slang

Collins reference: wanker = British derogatrory slang for "worthless person".
The other meaning is obvious....as Mrs Malaprop would say: mastication.
Liz   Sat Sep 02, 2006 1:23 pm GMT
<<'Ey mite.....vat guy aouvuh there...'e's a roi' merchant bankah!
(Current London type street wise accent)

Translation:
Hey, mate.....that guy over there....he's a right wanker.>>

Exactly! And sometimes you'd better say the first one --- at least if you don't want to utter the w-word in public :-)) But it's all the same: you will surely got beaten up for 'merchant banker' in some parts of the city, particularly in some establishments of the Soho... :-)) But nothing is worse than saying the following thing:

'Oh, my learned friend.....that gentleman over there.....he is indeed an impertinent young man.'(Of course it is said with an ultra mega posh and excrutiatingly well-spoken u-RP accent).

Long-term (I mean the healing of your injuries) effect is guaranteed!
Liz again   Sat Sep 02, 2006 3:25 pm GMT
Oops…pardon my ignorance. ’Impertinent’ is not exactly synonymous with ’wanker’. However, the word ’wanker’, being sort of an umbrella term (of abuse) for ’any kind of person whom you don’t like or whose behaviour you disapprove of’. That person need not necessarily be ’worthless’, he can deserve this ’compliment’ otherwise as well, like: the one who doesn’t greet you after you have greeted him, who drives too fast or too slow, who keeps looking or laughing at you when you are drunk, who (you think) is stupid, unpleasant etc etc (Just to illustrate this with a few examples - the list is much longer than that). Consequently, an ’impertinent young man’ can be a ’wanker’ or vice versa. (Of course, they are not stylistically interchangeable terms.)

So, ’impertinent young man’ is not the best ’posh’ counterpart of the w-word, but that came to mind! I still remember old ladies telling off their nephews / nieces for being ’sooo impertinent’!

So what could be the posh version of ’wanker’, if there is such a thing?