1.
(vulgar) you; used as a hostile or contemptuous form of address
A hostile or contemptuous way to say "you", heard in quarrels and in rough male speech in films and manga.
2.
(rough) oneself (reflexive: てめえで, てめえの)
In rough speech, "oneself", in reflexive phrases such as てめえのことはてめえでやれ. This keeps the older self-referring use of 手前.
A contraction of 手前 (literally "in front of one's hands"), which originally meant "myself" as a humble first-person pronoun. Over time the second-person usage became dominant, and the pronunciation shifted to てめえ. Now primarily used as a hostile way to address someone, expressing anger, contempt, or threat.
Etymology
手前 → てめえ (phonetic contraction). The shift from humble self-reference to aggressive second-person address parallels a similar evolution in 貴様.
Usage
- Extremely rude as a second-person pronoun — carries a threatening tone
- Common in anime, manga, and yakuza films, but rarely used in real-life conversation outside of genuine confrontations
- The self-referential sense ("oneself") survives in set phrases like てめえのことはてめえでやれ