Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(orig. UK society) exceedingly, excessively, very.

[1611		Davies of Hereford Scourge of Folly 7: Yet is he foolish, rude, and beastly-base].
1750		Rehearsal 26 May-2 June 272: The same Good Friday at Abington, when you were all beastly drunk [and] got all the fiddles in town to glory in your debauchery.
1761		New and General Biog. Dict.: V 398: Being entertained with a good supper and plenty of good liquor, he forgot his professed sanctity to such a scandalous degree as to make himself most beastly drunk.
1778		Thrale Thraliana i Mar.-Apr. 261: You got so beastly drunk that you were forced to be carried to Bed.
1783		Gent’s Mag. May 410/2: The room [...] is full of people who drink like beasts, and none of them escape being beastly drunk.
1804		T. Trotter Essay on Drunkenness 150: A man, returning home at night when beastly drunk, was attacked by his own house-dog.
1812		Spirit of Irish Wit 176: How beastly drunk he was.
1814		T. Creevey letter 14 June in Gore Creevey Papers (1948) 117: He came to Lady Salisbury on Sunday from his own dinner beastly drunk.
1833		A. Greene Life and Adventures of Dr Dodimus Duckworth II 175: Noah, of old, got drunk – ay, beastly drunk.
1837		Thackeray Yellowplush Papers in Works III (1898) 252: He went off to the hed tavern, and came home that evening beesly intawsicated.
1844		Dickens letter 18 Nov. in Letters (1893) 130: I was so beastly dirty when I got to this house .
1856		‘Cuthbert Bede’ Tales of College Life 19: Being so beastly hard up.
1865		Daily Tel. 24 Oct. 5/3: He was in good health... looked almost ‘beastly well,’ as I once heard it described [F&H].
1865		Dly Phoenix (Columbia, SC) 6 Dec. 4/2: ‘That fellow is beastly drunk,’ remarked the General.
1878		A. Lloyd ‘It Makes Me So Awfully Wild’ in Comic Songs 13: I have been such a beastly fool.
1883		Leighton Buzzard Obs. 13 Feb. 7/5: ‘This Beer is beastly bad tonight’ [...] ‘Beastly bad! Whatcher mean? No beer’s bad’ .
1884		C.F. Lummis letter 30 Oct. in Byrkit Letters from the Southwest (1989) 53: It gets too beastly cold.
1890		Bulletin (Sydney) 26 July 8/2: The Court Orderly – I beg your pardon for interrupting your worships, but there are six witnesses in the witness room, beastly drunk.
1899		A. Binstead Gal’s Gossip 149: For the wind was very gusty / And the course was beastly dusty.
1900		Marvel 12 Nov. 7: You’re rude – beastly rude!
1910		Marvel 15 Oct. 25: You are so beastly pig-headed.
1915		R.P. Hamilton diary 14 May 🌐 Beastly bored with everything, and damned uncomfortable.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 8: You said, Stephen answered, O, it’s only Dedalus whose mother is beastly dead.
1929		J.B. Priestley Good Companions 344: If somebody had told me that a carpenter from Shuddersford could be beastly nosey, just like a woman, I wouldn’t have believed them.
1936		‘George Orwell’ Keep The Aspidistra Flying (1962) 32: It was beastly cold.
1940		Derby Dly Teleg. 18 July 3/5: Beastly silly wheeze of a hole.
1950		J.F. Tuohy ‘Uncle George’ in Lehman Penguin New Writing No. 40 79: ‘Now I’m drunk,’ he announced. ‘I’m beastly tight’.