pinfinger

English

Etymology

From pin +‎ finger.

Noun

pinfinger (uncountable)

1. Synonym of knife game
   • 2017 April 6, Alex Renton, Stiff Upper Lip: Secrets, Crimes and the Schooling of a Ruling Class, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, →ISBN:

     Lambert also uncovers some nasty quasi-formal physical punishments dealt out by prefects to younger boys: whipping with a piece of rope dipped in brine at one school, fixed numbers of punches to the face for different crimes, and a Russian roulette game called pinfinger, which involved stabbing at the fingers with a geometry compass.

   • 2018 September 14, David Collard, “Put a spell on you”, in The Times Literary Supplement, number 6024, News UK:

     […] a nimble six-part sequence based on pinfinger, which involves stabbing repeatedly and with increasing rapidity between splayed fingers […]

   • 2018 September 25, Alex London, chapter 2, in Black Wings Beating, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, →ISBN:

     He had scars on all his fingers from where their father missed whenever he played a drunken game of pinfinger using Brysen’s spread hand pressed against the table.

   • 2020 June 23, Wren Handman, chapter 14, in Wire Wings, The Parliament House, →ISBN:

     She pretends she isn’t checking the time on the stopwatch hanging from her belt, takes out a knife and plays a bastard version of pinfinger between her feet, reveling in the way her balance trembles as she shifts from right to left.

   • 2021 June 4, Jim Meddick, “Monty”, in The Republican, page B7:

     JUST WORKING ON A RELATED SKILL… KNIFE GAME, OR PINFINGER…