[Belongs to FLAM sb.1; if sense 1 below be not a different word, the vb. is the earlier. Cf. FLIM-FLAM and FLAMFEW, of either of which flam may be a shortened form.]
† 1. trans. ? To counterfeit, ‘mock.’ Obs.
c. 1500. Ratis Raving, etc., 3687.
| Flam nocht the flouris at wyll faid, | |
| To mend hir mak at god has maid. |
2. To deceive by a sham story or trick, or by flattery; also, to flam off, up. Obs. exc. dial. or U.S.
1637. Heywood, Dial., Procus & Puella, ii. Wks. 1874, VI. 112.
| Pam. In sooth you do not well to jeere and flam | |
| Me, knowing in what wretched case I am. |
a. 1658. Ford, etc., Witch Edmonton, II. ii.
| Was this your cunning? and then flam me off | |
| With an old Witch, two Wives, and Winnifride? |
1660. Bonde, Scut. Reg., 188. A Company of Jesuitical treacherous Rebels, and damnable Usurpers, Who flaming the people in the mouth with a tale, that the supreme power was in the people, made use of this power themselves, against the wills of the people, as an Engine to perform and bring to passe all their wicked and horrible designs.
1692. South, Serm. (1697), 465. A God, who is not to be flamm’d off with Lyes, who knows exactly, what thou canst do, and what thou canst not.
1760. C. Johnston, Chrysal (1822), II. 296. No such tricks for me. I am not to be flammed so neither.
1837–40. Haliburton, Clockm. (1862), 153. I guess few would accept it as a bonâ fide draft, without some sponsible man to endorse it, that warn’t given to flammin.
1876. Whitby Gloss., Flam up, to cajole.
1884. Chesh. Gloss., Flam, to humbug, or deceive. ‘He’s only flammin.’
