English · Idiom Historical

cheap jack

Preserved but no longer current.

Both English Tiếng Việt

Meaning · English

A travelling vendor of small wares, who is usually ready to "cheapen" his goods, Le. take less for them than the price he first named.

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

người bán hàng rong nhỏ

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)

Sources & notes

Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.

Topics: Historical slang (1800s)

Common questions

What does “cheap jack” mean?

A travelling vendor of small wares, who is usually ready to "cheapen" his goods, Le. take less for them than the price he first named.

Is “cheap jack” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.

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