to put up one's dukes
2
9.5
- idiom
- Slang
:
prepararse para pelear
- As the confrontation grew tense, Jake instinctively put up his dukes in preparation for a brawl.
Examples
-
With no weapons, he puts up his dukes.
Fiction book (1996) -
Put 'em up, put up your dukes!
-
Come on, put up your dukes.
-
Put up your dukes, let's get down to it!
-
Feeling threatened, he decided to put up his dukes and defend himself.
-
After the argument escalated, she warned him to put up his dukes if he wanted to fight.
Synonyms
47
2.0
To fight another person using the fists, often as a sport
18
7.0
To start a fight or bold competition to show strength
Antonyms
How Aggressive
∞
1.0
455
1.4
- Slang
2
9.5
987
3.3
49
3.2
Surface Forms
Morphology
put + up + one's + dukes
The phrasal verb 'put up' clearly conveys 'raise' or 'hold up', so if a learner knew that 'dukes' is slang for 'fists' they could transparently infer 'raise one's fists'. However, 'dukes' as a slang term is lexicalized and not predictable from the literal word 'duke' (a noble title) and is not cross-linguistically obvious, so the expression is only partially compositional and may be unfamiliar to B1 learners.
Etymology
Put up one's dukes comes from old slang where dukes meant 'fists' and put up meant to lift them. Imagine someone literally lifting their hands to punch or to protect themselves, so the phrase means 'to raise one's fists in preparation to fight or defend yourself'.