What is "larrikin"

Larrikin \Lar"ri*kin\, n. [Cf. E. dial. larrikin a mischievous or frolicsome youth, larrick lively, careless, larack to frolic, to romp.] A rowdy street loafer; a rowdyish or noisy ill-bred fellow; a hoodlum; -- variously applied, as to a street blackguard, a street Arab, a youth given to horse-play, etc. [Australia & Eng.] -- a. Rowdy; rough; disorderly. [Australia & Eng.]

Mobs of unruly larrikins.
--Sydney Daily Telegraph.

Note: Larrikin is often popularly explained by the following anecdote (which is without foundation): An Irish policeman at Melbourne, on bringing a notorious rough into court, was asked by the magistrate what the prisoner had been doing, and replied, ``He was a-larrikin' [i. e., a-larking] about the streets.''

a. (context Australian slang English) Exhibiting the characteristics or behaviour of a larrikin; playfully rebellious against and contemptuous of authority and convention. n. 1 (context Australia New Zealand slang dated English) A brash and impertinent, possibly violent, troublemaker, especially a youth; a hooligan. 2 (context Australia slang English) A high-spirited person who playfully rebels against authority and conventional norms.

Larrikin is an Australian English term meaning "a mischievous young person, an uncultivated, rowdy but good hearted person", or "a person who acts with apparent disregard for social or political conventions".

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the term generally meant "a lout, a hoodlum" or "a young urban rough, a hooligan", meanings which became obsolescent.