English

Noun

cleanskin ‎(plural cleanskins)

1. (Australia) An unbranded animal.
   • 1921, Joseph Furphy, Rigby′s Romance, Gutenberg Australia eBook #0607461h,

     No one had any clear notion of how many head might be collected, but we counted on something over four hundred--possibly up to five hundred and fifty, including calves and cleanskins.

   • 1988, Tom Cole, **** West and Crooked:

     I started off lassoing the cleanskins, dragging them up bellowing to the bronco panel where they were quickly leg-roped, thrown and branded.

   • 1995, Darrell Lewis & Charles Schultz, Beyond the Big Run, p. 96:

     The bullocks would be in the lead and you'd whip in and let the bullocks go to ****, but hang to your cleanskins as much as you could.

2. Someone with no prior criminal record, a person with no previous convictions; loosely, someone who has not done anything wrong before, an unblemished character.
   • 2007, Poul Anderson, Shocking Australian True Crime Stories, page 169,

     Ryan′s natural father was a cleanskin – a police term for a person with no criminal history – who found himself caught up in the world of career criminals when he married into The Clan.

   • 2010, Gaby Hinsliff, The Guardian, 19 Apr 2010:

     So the only strategy likely to hurt Clegg in those circumstances involves arguing that the Lib Dems are part of the mould too – not cleanskins, but a party with 60-plus MPs in that last discredited parliament.

3. (Australia, New Zealand) An unlabelled bottle of wine.
   • 2010, Teresa Ooi, The Australian, 16 Apr 2010:

     Mr McKenzie said that two years ago a decent bottle of sauvignon blanc sold for $15 to $20, but today prices were down to $10 a bottle. "More cleanskins entering the market is the first indication there is too much SB out there," he said.

   • 2010, Terry Lee Stone, Managing the Design Process Implementing Design: An Essential Manual for the Working Designer, page 47,

     In 2009, Back Label commissioned Voice to design a label for its cleanskin.

   • 2011, Craig Sherborne, The Amateur Science of Love, p. 64:

     My eye-whites still woke up bright and clear despite the night before's two bottles of cheap cleanskin wine.

4. An undercover police officer who has not done a particular task before.
5. (cricket) A cricket bat with no maker's logo

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