back street

¹

noun

1. a street apart from the main or business area of a town.

back-street

²

[bak-street]

adjective

1. taking place in secrecy and often illegally.

   back-street political maneuvering; back-street drug dealing.

Word History and Origins

Origin of back street¹

First recorded in 1630–40

Origin of back street²

First recorded in 1895–1900

Idioms and Phrases

Also, back alley. A less prominent or inferior location; also, a scene of clandestine or illegal dealings. For example, The highway department is very slow to clear snow from the back streets, or Before they were made legal, abortions were often performed in back alleys. Although back street literally means “one away from the main or business area of a town or city,” this term, from the early 1600s, became associated with underhanded dealings, and back alley, from the mid-1800s, is always used in this sense.

Example Sentences

Saturday morning in a back street in south London - and I am leaning on a metal railing.

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With the man's son directing them, the HTS security force drives to one of the poorer neighbourhoods, weaving through a warren of back streets, past scrapyards and middens.

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He said the incident happened at the Hope of Hart children's club, which is housed in a former warehouse building on a back street.

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Harris Steinberg, 57, standing at the counter of his auto parts shop, said that everything along Kensington Avenue — the tents, dealers and stray needles — was already moving to the neighborhood’s back streets.

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A hair salon in a Kharkiv back street is one of many small businesses with a generator whirring noisily outside the door.

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Related Words

• artery 
• asphalt 
• avenue 
• boulevard 
• byway 
• expressway 
• freeway 
• highway 
• lane 
• parking lot 
• path 
• pathway 
• pavement 
• route 
• street 
• subway 
• superhighway 
• terrace 
• thoroughfare 
• turnpike