Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also chim-cham) an idle tale, a piece of nonsense.

1570		Marriage of Wit and Science II i: Can I remember a longe tale of a man in the moone, With such circumstaunce and such flym flam.
1589		Nashe Death and Buriall of Martin Mar-Prelate in Works I (1883–4) 174: Leave thy flim flam tales, and loytering lies [...] the trueth is this.
1593		G. Harvey Pierce’s Supererogation 150: His own Flimflams [...] masketh his aduersary more then an Asse, and lesse then no-thing.
1619		J. Taylor ‘A Kicksey Winsey’ in Works (1869) II 39: They with a courtly tricke, or a flim-flam, do nod at me, whilst I the noddy am.
c.1620		Beaumont & Fletcher Little French Lawyer II iii: This is a pretty flim-flam.
c.1664		C. Sackville ‘Another Letter from Lord Buckhurst to Mr. Etheredge’ in Stephenson Yard of Wit (2003) 126: For what but Prick and Cunt does raise / Our thoughts to Songs, and Roundelays? Enables us to Anagrams / And other Amorous flim flams?
1680		M. Stevenson Wits Paraphras’d 84: Your letter stuft with all the shams / That canting Gosips call flim flams.
1729		Swift ‘Epistle Upon an Epistle’ in Chalmers Eng. Poets XI (1810) 477/2: Most think that what has been heap’d on you, To other sort of folk was due: Rewards too great for your flim-flams, Epistles, riddles, epigrams.
1740		R. North Examen 151: The Reason, of all this Chim-cham Stuff, is the ridiculous Undertaking, of the Author, to prove Oates’s Plot.
1749		Fielding Tom Jones (1959) 630: I thought thou hadst been a lad of higher mettle than to give way to a parcel of maidenish tricks. – I tell thee ’tis all flim-flam.
1780		H. Cowley Belle’s Stratagem III i: Look you, Mr. Curate; don’t think to come over me with your flim-flams, for a better man than ever trod in your shoes is coming over-sea to marry me.
1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (3rd edn) n.p.: Flim flams; idle stories.
1805		I. Disraeli Flim-flams; or the Life and Errors of my Uncle, and the Amours of my Aunt [F&H].
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1825		C. Lamb Munden in London Mag. Feb. n.p.: I wonder you can put such flim-flams upon us, sir [F&H].
1865		Bradford Obs. 2 Mar. 6/6: [heading] The Flim-Flams of Convocation.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1886		Yorks. Gaz. 23 Jan. 8/5: I see that there is a resurrection of the ‘flim-flam’ about Minting [a racehorse].
1893		Gloucs. Citizen 17 Aug. 3/5: This assurance has proved to be a perfect flim-flam.
1895		Truth (Sydney) 17 Feb. 3/4: And don’t we just know the political Deadhead, / And the flim-flam of the Cheap Public Picnic.
1897		E.W. Townsend Chimmie Fadden 70: I never taut dere was so much flim-flam about getting ready t’ be married.
1902		Ade Breaking Into Society (1904) 55: The Missus was a firm Believer in all these How-To Flim-Flams that run in the Monthly Magazines.
1913		J. London Valley of the Moon (1914) 172: Nitsky on damages—contributory negligence, or [...] something-or-other flimflam.
1915		T.A. Dorgan Indoor Sports 19 June [synd. cartoon] One rehearsal should be enough for this flim.
1921		N. Putnam West Broadway 65: I was actually being kidnapped and no fillum-flam about it.
1926		J. Devanny Butcher Shop 105: Never did Marguerite take the Absolute as a standard [...] laying down definite lines of demarcation between this and that, she discarded as so much flim-flam.
1930		(con. 1900s–10s) Dos Passos 42nd Parallel in USA (1966) 317: Ed had beaten it to Chi on account of some flimflam about raffling off a watch.
1936		Abderdeen Jrnl 17 Nov. 2/4: I don’t give too hoots about Nationalism and all the flim-flam of the exotic Natonalist.
1939		T. Wolfe Web and the Rock 336: Back here the flim-flam and flummery of the front was all forgotten.
1942		W. Winchell On Broadway 5 Sept. [synd. col.] Saroyan must be confused about the critics who lauded his flim-flam — even when they said some of it made no sense.
1952		Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 248: They alibied themselves and minimized the extent of the flimflam.
a.1968		Martin Luther King Speech: The only thing that power respects is power ... There will be no flim-flam, no sell out.
1976		R. Carver Stories (1985) 116: She was always turning up with some [...] little flimflam that went hay-wire after a day or two.
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 5: The use of alliteration and rhyme, as in boob tube, claptrap, crumb bum, flim-flam, gobbledygook, goo-goo, rinky-dink, ticky-tacky, and wishy-washy.
1998		Source Oct. 224: Despite all the ‘back’naday, e’ything waas about peace’ flim-flam.
2006		D. Mitchell Black Swan Green 140: I also hope you will consider [...] what is merely . . . flim-flam . . . grandstanding . . . froth . . . posturing . . . egotism.
2010		K. Richards Life 235: Satanic Majesties [...] was all a bit of flimflam to me.

2. (orig. US) a confidence trick, a criminal hoax, orig. a short-change swindle.

1881		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 19 Nov. 10/1: All schemes of this kind [i.e. cheating of shopkeepers] are called flim-flam by the men engaded in them.
c.1895		F. Norris Vandover and the Brute (1914) 233: You would feel as though I had taken advantage of you at this time and worked a flim-flam on you!
1903		H. Hapgood Autobiog. of a Thief 273: From flim-flam (returning short change) to burglary is but a step, provided one has the nerve.
1910		O. Johnson Varmint 56: What’s the flimflam today?
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 56: There was a picture of a naval officer bowing low before a girl, with this caption: ‘They All Salaam to the Old Flim Flam that Never Dies’.
1936		Mencken Amer. Lang. (4th edn) 557: [Slang’s] content may be divided into two categories: (a) old words, whether used singly or in combination, that have been put to new uses, usually metaphorical, and (b) new words that have not yet been admitted to the standard vocabulary [...] examples of the second are hoosegow, flimflam, blurb, bazoo and blab.
1944		C.B. Davis Rebellion of Leo McGuire (1953) 235: The whole thing was a flim-flam.
1956		J. Blake letter 22 Jan. Joint (1972) 76: But dissembled, it’s a new kind of flimflam.
1966		B. Jackson Get Your Ass in the Water (1974) 113: I was the hustlest motherfucker the world ever seen. / ’Cause I made most of my money playing flim-flam.
1976		R. Sabbag Snowblind (1978) 30: It meant that the bookie was working for him, and the flim-flam was on whoever his and Swan’s drinking companions happened to be.
1993		C. Hiaasen Strip Tease 115: As for her Social Security flimflam, that was a federal crime.
2007		N. ‘Razor’ Smith Raiders 133: I inadvertently became the victim of one of his flim-flams.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 16: A punk I popped for flimflam made me and beat feet.

3. attrib. use of sense 2.

1881		Trumble Man Traps of N.Y. 28: The amount of money a good flim-flam operator can obtain in one day depends upon the character and condition of his victims.
1904		O. Kildare Good of the Wicked 17: ‘Second-story’ Connors and ‘Flim-flam’ Myers, two gentlemen depending on their wits for support.
1909		I.L. Nascher Wretches of Povertyville 45: If he gives a large bill to the waiter, the latter may decamp or practice the flimflam game, a sleight-of-hand trick whereby he extracts a bill after having counted the change in the presence of the visitor.
1969		M. Puzo Godfather 226: The flimflam home improvement gyp artists, the door-to-door con men were politely warned.
1991		B. Hamper Rivethead (1992) 196: I had become terribly weary of hearing a number of these flim-flam rock ’n’ mongers pluggin’ up the airwaves with their detached meanderings.

4. (US) a confidence trickster.

1992

D. Pinckney High Cotton (1993) 138: Those flimflams are at the Drop again.

5. (US) a deceptive, untrustworthy person.

1908		K. McGaffey Sorrows of a Show Girl Ch. ii: I would steer no friend of a friend of mine up against a flim flam where there’s so many nice girls running loose.
1936		(ref. to 1920s) L. Duncan Over the Wall 147: A special table composed of their own ilk, ex-Congressmen, ex-State Representatives, and other ritzy flim-flams.