Green’s Dictionary of Slang

to hoax; to make fun of.

1738		Swift Polite Conversation 42: Her Ladyship was plaguily bamb’d; I warrant it put her into the Hipps.
1747		Garrick Miss in her Teens II i: I’ll break a lamp, bully a constable, bam a justice, or bilk a box-keeper with any man in the liberties of Westminster.
1766		Midnight Spy (c.1929) 63: The gentleman’s name is Bamwell [...] he is versed in all the arts of fraud.
1772		Bridges Burlesque Homer (3rd edn) 104: My little girl, if folks don’t bam me, / Cries bitterly to see her mammy.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: To Bam, to impose on any one by a falsity, also to jeer or make fun of any one I can queer and bam.
c.1805		‘The Rage’ in Jovial Songster 19: Be’t to bam, or to hoax, or to queer, or to quis, / Or howe’er in the ton you are flashing.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1826		Vulgarities of Speech Corrected.
1830		Marryat King’s Own 349: Now, you’re bamming me – don’t attempt to put such stories off on your old granny.
1838		T. Haliburton Clockmaker II 109: I believe, on my soul, you’ve been abammin’ of me the whole blessed time.
1843		T. Haliburton Sam Slick in England II 10: I can bam as well as any man when bam is the word.
1845		R.S. Surtees Hillingdon Hall III 97: The women, charged with palmistry — bamming farmer Goosecap about a gold mine under the hill at the back of his ’ouse, while the men tried to rob his ’en roost.
1859		Massey in Sat. Rev. (London) 5 Mar. n.p.: Our greatest of men is the Harlequin Pam, ‘The Times’ says so, and ‘The Times’ cannot bam! [F&H].
1860		T. Haliburton Season Ticket 19: Stranger! he is only a bammin of you.
1884		Henley & Stevenson Admiral Guinea II i: Old Pew’s too smart to be bammed with a soft half-tusheroon.