Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to catch, to take.

1607		Middleton Trick to Catch the Old One I iv: The rogue has spied me now; he nibbled me finely once, too.
1623		Dekker Welsh Embassador II i: He changed you to a stalkinge horse [...] my poore girle Armante niblinge you strangled her, gott her from the Contract hee was ty’d in.
1812		Spirit of Irish Wit 100: ‘I hope you won’t nibble any of my property’.
1821		‘An Amateur’ Real Life in London I 550: Why, the traps have nibbled him. He is arrested, and gone to a lock-up shop, a place of mere accommodation for gentlemen to take up their abode.
1833		‘The Lively Kid’ in Rake’s Budget in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) III 87: A Peelman nibbled him on the go / Ere the office quick could warn him.
1837		C. Dance Bengal Tiger 19: You have nibbled a promise of marriage from their rich old uncle, in order to cut them out of the money.
1843		W.T. Moncrieff Scamps of London III i: You are spliced – nibbled at last – well, I wish you joy.
1855		W. Phillips Wild Tribes of London 65: Poor old Bill! we were great cronies once; nibbled him, though, in that affair of the stolen goods at Shadwell.

2. in sexual contexts.

3. to take a drink.

1680		M. Stevenson Wits Paraphras’d 98: I call for Liquor to be nibling.
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 21: I went right on selling goods and nibbling at the red-eye. [Ibid.] 195: I began nibbling at the red Chianti.
1947		G. Kersh Prelude to a Certain Midnight Bk I Ch. 11: What do you say we go nibble a drink?
1960		P. Rabe Murder Me for Nickels (2004) 98: She went haha too and nibbled at her drink.
1971		L. Sanders Pleasures of Helen 228: They just sat there, nibbling their drinks.

4. to pilfer, to work as a petty thief.

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 254: nibble to pilfer trifling articles, not having spirit to touch any thing of consequence.
1821		‘An Amateur’ Real Life in London I 131: That was the man that nibbled the Jontleman’s dive and must have ding’d away the wipe, or else what should he bolt for?
1835		‘The Spring Bedstead’ Knowing Chaunter 18: And the blowen so alert, / Had nibbled all my money.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1873		Sl. Dict.

5. to assess a possible purchase [cit. refers to a fraudulent investment].

[1707

N. Ward ‘The Humours of a Coffee-House’ in Writings (1704) 296: Now we find you begin to Nibble, I don’t Question but we shall make you Gorge the bait, before we have done with you].

6. to make a purchase.

1931

D. Runyon ‘A Nice Price’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 191: They are still nibbling at the 3 to 1.

7. (US campus) to have a mild argument.

1989

P. Munro Sl. U.