Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a general negative intensifier, a euph. for bloody adj.; thus bally heck, bloody hell.

1853		Boston Globe (MA) 17 Apr. 13/2: ‘I am a bally ass — really’.
1884		Sporting Times 1 Nov. 1/5: You must [...] have some sin on your mind, or you wouldn’t fear all the bally lighning in the world.
1889		J.K. Jerome Three Men in a Boat 26: Bally tent’s blown down, I think.
1889		Sporting Times 6 July Answers to Correspondents: H.G. Steele. – Thanks. What a bally idiot you must be [F&H].
1890		Bird o’ Freedom 15 Jan. 1/3: Course I’m drunk [...] demned drunk; but I’ll get—get over it. But your a bally hog, and you’ll never get over it.
1894		Civil & Milit. Gaz. (Lahore) 18 Oct. 4/3: If we wos [i.e. generals] — where’ your army? — Gone fut, / Knocked into a bally cocked ’at!
1894		H. Lawson ‘His Country — After All’ in Roderick (1972) 203: I can’t see much in Australia. The bally colonies are —.
1895		W. Pett Ridge Minor Dialogues 142: R.’s got a cold or some bally rot.
1896		Harrington & LeBrunn [perf. Marie Lloyd] Maid of London Ere We Part 🎵 [Y]ou can keep the bally house and bally furniture.
1900		J. Conrad Lord Jim 147: Jove! wouldn’t do to lose the thing. He meditated gravely over his fist. Had it! Would hang the bally affair round his neck!
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 13 Nov. 4/7: They have made bally asses of themselves.
1906		New Boys’ World 29 Dec. 95: I was looking to see how many more bally idiots there were in this room.
1906		Civil & Milit. Gaz. (Lahore) 13 Mar. 8/3: His examination of the lance with the ‘bally rag’ and his decision not to ‘chuck a dinner for a rotten battle’ evoked the heartiest merriment.
1910		Wodehouse Psmith in the City (1993) 35: It seems to me [...] that we are in for a pretty rotten time of it in this bally bank.
1911		Civil & Milit. Gaz. (Lahore) 22 July 7/1: He was encored to the last breath after his rendering of ‘My bally eye glass’.
1912		Truth (Wellington, NZ) 22 June 1/7: The mugs who went upon the stage to make bally fools of themselves were promised half-a-crown.
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 31 Jan. 9/4: They Say [...] Don’t be such a bally melon, Rita .
1915		F. Garrett diary 21 Sept. 🌐 Both feet went crook so went to see the quack. He never even looked at them [...] I’m a bally malingerer I suppose.
1916		Joyce Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man 119: Shut up, will you. Don’t make such a bally racket!
1917		A.G. Empey Over the Top 111: Like a lot of bally idiots several of the battery men fell for their game.
1919		A. Baer Two & Three 5 Apr. [synd. col.] We don’t know whether the bally referee was a believer in the ocult [sic].
1919		‘Sapper’ Mufti 7: Derek scooped the bally lot as usual.
1920		‘Sapper’ Bulldog Drummond 111: And so he’s found the bally fox [...] What do we do, sergeant-major?
1922		E. Raymond Tell England (1965) 32: This bally book’s all wrong.
1926		Breton & Bevir Adventures of Mrs. May 62: My motter is same as my family’s, ‘Honest is ’er who ’as the bally pence’.
1927		Chillicothe (MO) Constitution 17 Jan. 3/4: [headline] Bally Amerian [sic] Slang A Bit Thick. Eh, What?
1934		Wodehouse Right Ho, Jeeves 62: The fellow’s bally life was being ruined by the loss of a girl.
1936		West. Australian (Perth) 6 June n.p.: These beastly fellahs should be shot: / Their bally beastly din / Is not quaite raight, not quaite. / What? What?
1949		Wodehouse Mating Season 69: Of course I want you to win the bally girl you love.
c.1943		S .J. Baker Aus. Vulgarisms [t/s] 6: Bloody: blast, blow, blazes, blinking, blank, blanky, ruddy, muddy, bleeding, blessed, blooming, blamed, bally. Blimey and blighter are also related.
1954		Wodehouse Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit 7: And I’m not sure it wasn’t ‘bally rot’.
1955		P. White Tree of Man (1956) 57: We’re milkun the two big beasts hand over fist, and the bally heifer comun in.
1960		Wodehouse Jeeves in the Offing 59: Whether you liked the bally thing or didn’t, the point was that it had vanished.
1965		J.P. Carstairs Concrete Kimono 125: Think it’s some bally palais-de-dance, Trenton?
1969		Pete Townshend ‘Pinball Wizard’ 🎵 I thought I was the bally table king / But I just handed my pinball crown to him.
1976		P. Theroux Family Arsenal 28: Where would I park the bally thing?
1995		D. Lodge Therapy (1996) 12: There’s no bally reason why the knee should be giving you any more pain.
2000		Guardian G2 18 May 1: Crikey, Biggles, they’re turning you into a bally Hollywood hero.

2. (Aus.) as infix.

1910		Sun. Times (Perth) 15 May 2nd sect. 12/5: Gentleman of Chinese nationality. Promoting Literature and Education. Oh, cli! Hoo-bally lay!