Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a wife.

a.1661

‘To Whom it Concerns’ in Rump Poems and Songs (1662) i 113: Correct your prick-ear’d Seervants; and perswade / You long lov’d Arm-fulls; if you can thus trade / In Pigges and Poultry.

2. a plump woman.

1846		D. Corcoran Pickings from N.O. Picayune 200: O, blud-in-ages but it’s yoursel’ [i.e. a portrait of a fat girl] is the fine armful.
1891		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 24 Jan. 6/2: Mary was a chunky little armful of sweetness .
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 15 Dec. 11/3: Also, legislators are nearly all quite middle-aged and prefer sylph-like women. It is only the man who is young and fresh that dotes on ‘armfuls.’.
c.1935		‘Lou Gehrig Goes West’ [comic strip] in B. Adelman Tijuana Bibles (1997) 118: Give me a hefty armful like Mae West.
1951		Cusack & James Come in Spinner (1960) 10: Boy, what an armful!

3. (US) an attractive woman.

1921		Broadway Brevities Dec. 44/1: Last month, in a moment of temporary aberration, we described someone called Margaret Kay as ‘a cute little armful.’ Will you forgive us?
1935		E. Freeman ‘The Whirling Hub’ in Afro-American (Baltimore, MD) 22 June 15/3: Bud Fisher, gliding with an armful.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

4. (US Black) a girlfriend.

1940

Pittsburgh Courier (PA) 17 Feb. 7/1: He is thinking of going all the way to the altar with his latest armful.

see sense 2 above.

see elbow-bender under elbow n.¹

especially energetic masturbation.

1999		Roger’s Profanisaurus 3 in Viz 98 Oct. 3: armbreaker euph. A particularly vicious wank. ‘What with excellent browsing and sluicing and a couple of armbreakers and what-not, Bertie’s afternoon passed quite happily.’ (from ‘Wooster Wanks Himself Daft’ by P.G. Wodehouse).
2001		P. Meditzy ‘A Day In The Life Of...’ 29 Apr. 🌐 I was spending the day in the house on my own and had already ‘knocked a few out’ including a couple of ‘arm breakers’ when I decided there was more to life than ‘burping the worm’ all the time.

1. (N.Z. drugs) the kit or ‘works’ that are used for a narcotics injection.

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 7/2: arm gear n. (also armo gear) 1 a hypodermic syringe, needle, tourniquet, etc.; the equipment used to inject intravenous drugs into the main vein in one's (left) arm.

2. (N.Z. drugs) any form of (narcotic) drug that is injected, e.g. heroin.

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 7/2: arm gear n. (also armo gear) 2 any kind of drug that is injected into one’s arm.

(US black) a (female) companion, whose arm is hooked through ones own.

1936

Archie Seale Man About Harlem 18 Apr. [synd. col.] The La Mar Cheri [...] enticed [...] their regular crowd of lovely lookers and too many seemed to be out with the wrong arm-hooker.

a companion, i.e. one who is ‘on one’s arm’.

1976		D. Hall Dock Ellis 107: [S]he was no armpiece. [...] Daughter of a lawyer, Paula was an accomplished athlete, a swimmer, and a good student.
1999		Indep. Rev. 30 June 4: Never mind their armpieces, who was that gorgeous babe the quartet were boogieing on down to at a New York rock club?
2002		C. Stella Jimmy Bench-Press 125: The girl there? [...] Larry’s arm piece, Leanna.
2010		R.G. Clary Sexual Wreckage [ebook] Joyce was a beautiful armpiece...a chic and hot looking blond with great tits.

crutches.

1821		W.T. Moncrieff Tom and Jerry II vi: If any lady or gemmen is inclined for a dance, I’ll nash my arm-props in a minute – (throws down his crutches).
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.

(Aus.) of a drink, weak.

1905

Sun. Times (Perth) 22 Oct. 4/7: Even the liquor is all arms and legs — there’s no ‘body’ in it.

extensive, substantial.

1660		Wandring Whore III 7: There’s my sister [...] who div’d, and pickt by her own acknowledgement, nine pieces of Gold out of a Cullies pocket at one clap, a bagg of silver as long as her arm (almost) at another clap.
c.1685		Dorset ‘On Dolly Chamberlain, A Seamstress’ in Works of Rochester, Roscommon, Dorset (1720) 26: In Revenge I will stitch / Up the Hole next her Breech, / With a Needle as long as my Arm.
c.1800		song in Papers of Francis Place (1819) n.p.: He took her to his fathers Barn then he pulled out his long consarn [?] / And it was as long – as this my arm. / And he called it little Davy.
1803		Sporting Mag. Aug. XXII 278/2: He only runs up a bill as long as my arm.
1817		M. Edgeworth Love and Law I ii: Corkeran the cooper’s bill, as long as my arm.
1834		‘Going To Be Confirmed’ in Luscious Songster 13: The saint pull’d a face full as long as my arm.
1836		D. Crockett Exploits and Adventures (1934) 190: He commenced singing, and his list of songs seemed to be as long as a rainy Sunday.
1855		W. Phillips Wild Tribes of London 61: Downy Dick, we call him [...] Dick’s got a head as long as your arm, and that’s a fact.
1900		Manchester Courier 31 Mar. 14/2: Rocky felt as if he had sand in his head, and a headache as long as a rainy Sunday.
1903		Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Nov. 35/2: Y’ go t’ a rejister an’ e’ hitches y’ up straight ’n end. If y’ go t’ a pars’n ’e gives yo’ a sermon long ’s me arm an’ prays over yo’ like a bloomin’ corpse, an’ then ’e sez ‘Five quid!’ The rejister’s on’y ten bob an’ no prayin’.
1909		Dly Missoulian (MT) 2 May 10/2: His patience is twice as long as a rainy Sunday.
1948		C. Hamlin ‘Killer Come Home’ in Ruhm Hard-Boiled Detective (1977) 335: They got records as long as my arm.
1956		J. Curtis Look Long Upon a Monkey 181: You’ve a list of charges against you as long as me arm.
1984		Flame : a Life on the Game 20: Sandra had a criminal record as long as your arm.

(US) to boast.

1966		in DARE.
c.1970		Halpert Collection n.p.: Don’t break your arm [Said to someone bragging] [DARE].

to take risks.

1867		Buchan Obs. 18 Oct. 3/7: As to daily communication between the two places, Mr Murray merely chances his arm at the long bow.
1889		Maidstone Jrnl 10 Sept. 7/2: [A] stalwart navvy [...] stating that if the meeting were not allowed to proceed quietly he would chance his arm against the interrupter.
1893		Illus. Police News 21 Jan. 4/2: Wel, father, are you going to chance your arm and try to spot the pasteboard?
1897		H. Compton King’s Hussar 35: Old Rootee forgot his prudence, and ‘chanced his arm’ — as the saying goes, when a man risks losing his stripes — by a visit to the canteen, which brought him about nightfall to the guard-room,.
1906		E. Pugh Spoilers 107: An’ I thinks to myself, ‘She’s a kind ’un, I bet. I’ll go an’ chance my bloomin’ arm and arst her for a bit o’ tommy’.
1912		E. Pugh City Of The World 265: Don’t chance your arm in this here town, or there’ll be the deuce of a shine!
1923		P. MacGill Moleskin Joe 74: I’ve done a short tucker stretch for three weeks, and so I’m chancin’ my arm on Glencorrie, for a wee while.
1936		J. Curtis Gilt Kid 41: You thought you’d come up to London and chance your arm.
1943		‘Henry Green’ Caught (2001) 66: I’ll chance my arm on this occasion.
1956		J. Curtis Look Long Upon a Monkey 93: Showed what life was: chanced his arm, tried to be a hero.
1966		P. Boyle At Night All Cats Are Grey 69: To think of that barbarous bloody quack [...] chancing his arm at a minute job like removing a body’s testaments. [Ibid.] 169: He has asked me out for the morrow night. D’you think should I chance my arm and go out with him?
1974		G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 261: He would transfer as a DCI, and decided to chance his arm by going on the line.
1984		‘Derek Raymond’ He Died with His Eyes Open 134: Christ [...] you’re chancing your arm. I’ve never heard anyone come on like that before.
1996		D. Healy Bend for Home 276: Arthur Daley, she says. I like that thing. He’s always chancing his arm.
2002		O’Byrne Files: Dublin Sl. Dict. 🌐 Chance one’s arm v. phr. Take a risk.

(US) to wait at tables.

1911		T.A. Dorgan ‘Daffydills’ in El Paso Herald (TX) 13 July 10: ‘Hey Mr Waiter, what does this mean in New York talk?’ Oh piped the man who deals them off the arm, it means [etc].
1921		O.O. McIntyre Bits of New York Life 17 Jan. [synd. col.] John himself with sleeves rolled up deal[s] ’em off the arm and sees that no one takes his place for any ‘charitable dump.’.
1928		T.A. Dorgan in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 101: He was head chef and dish nurse while she made change and dealt them off the arm.
1931		D. Runyon ‘Dream Street Rose’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 49: My friend deals them off the arm for the guys in her mamma’s boarding-house.
1943		R.L. Bellem ‘Feature Snatch!’ Dan Turner - Hollywood Detective Feb. 🌐 I [...] hied myself to a cheap beanery on lower Hollywood Boulevard where a dish by the name of Mae Hainey dealt ‘em off the arm.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 88: In the big town, no job, has to deal them off the arm in hashhouse again.

see under drop v.¹

(drugs) a serious narcotics addiction.

1960

C. Cooper Jr Scene (1996) 292: ‘I use sixteenths, and they last me about three days.’ ‘You got a real fat arm man.’.

a phr. used to describe a habitual thief.

1893

Proceedings Old Bailey 11 Sept. 1249: He said he had a manager there who was long in the arm, meaning the manager robbed him.

to stretch out one’s arm to grab something.

1787		J. Nott (ed.) Select Odes from Hafez 77: [note] In familiar language, we often say, that we make a long arm for any thing which we endeavour to reach.
1817		G. Colman Elsmere and Rosa II 331: Our chance is for this world only, but in regard to heaven is is put far out of reach. Elsmere, however [...] was willing to make a long arm for it.
1821		Blackwood’s Edin. Mag. Feb. 532: I make a long arm from this side the Humber, and hope one as long from the Forth will be stretched out to meet it.
1839		Knickerbocker Mag. Nov. 425: I shall therefore make a long arm, and reach forward into the dominions of posterity, and gather up such crumbs as come within the reach of my fingers.
1853		Ainsworth’s Mag. 480: But, alas ! my wife [...] set the table in a roar by requesting the captain, not to ‘make a long arm,’ but to ‘make a long nose,’ and pass her the mustard!
1869		Fraser’s Mag. Jan. 70/1: When the one had had his smoke, he was expected to ‘make a long arm’ and hand it over to the other.
1874		‘Old Calabar’ Won in a Canter I 143: ‘Just make a long arm will you, old fellow, and pass the whisky?’.
1905		Sporting Times 11 Mar. 2/5: He settled himself down to his coffee, and made a long arm at the muffins.
1910		Wodehouse Psmith in the City (1993) 61: Make a long arm for the shovel, Comrade Jackson.
1916		J. Buchan Greenmantle (1930) 257: If there was anything to blab, sooner or later Peter would blab it. Then they would stretch out a long arm and nip you short, wherever you were.
1930		D. Hammett ‘The First Thin Man’ in Nightmare Town (2001) 389: He put out a long arm and stopped a waiter.
1939		P.G. Brewster ‘Folk “Sayings” From Indiana’ in AS XIV:4 267: [If he] is having dinner with the latter’s family, he will be urged by Sam’s ‘woman’ to ‘make a long arm and reach’.

(US) spontaneous.

1942

S. Johnston Q. of Flat-tops 32: Shonk, it turned out, was an ‘off-the-arm’ poet [HDAS].

1. (US) for free, on credit.

1926		Maines & Grant Wise-crack Dict. 12/1: On the arm – Something for nothing in the entertainment industry.
1945		L. Hoban ‘Time to Kill’ Crack Detective Jan. 🌐 But five C’s — when you were just contemplating if Shanty Sam around the corner would go on the arm for another couple of hamburgers — definitely was real kush.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 168/2: Put on the arm. To take something on credit without any intention of repaying, the credit being given as a result of intimidation — indirect petty ex-tortion.
1952		I, Mobster 78: They’ll wind up putting drinks on the arm.
1967		A. Niederhogger Behind the Shield 55: [of NYPD sl.] ‘Hairy’ stands for smart, shrewd, and conniving. ‘On the arm,’ and ‘egghead’ are fairly well known in common parlance.
1979		E. Torres After Hours 6: Dave is workin’ mostly on the arm now, since [...] I am in a financial state of insoluble.
1987		(con. 1970s) J. Pistone Donnie Brasco (2006) 118: Mira never spent his own money. Everything was ‘on the arm’ — free with him.
1989		J. Morton Lowspeak 13: On the arm – eating and drinking without payment.
1991		in J. Breslin Damon Runyon (1992) 140: Acton was known as John Paul Jones, for the amount of time he spent at sea, on the arm, raising a glass of champagne to the setting sun.
2013		N. Knight ‘Not Even a Mouse’ in ThugLit Nov.-Dec. [ebook] ‘I know's a projector at this revival house—plays an all-nighter every year [...] It’ll be on the arm’.
2016		Barer et al. Betrayal in Blue 123: Ken thought Baron was on the arm—police slang for a business owner who doled out favors to the neighborhood cops.

2. (US) subject to corruption or influence.

2017		D. Winslow The Force [ebook] He’s never been able to prove it, but Malone would bet his left testicle that Berger has judges on the arm.
2019		D. Winslow Border [ebook] Darnell has everyone within five square blocks on the arm. His slingers on the corner look out for her, his boys walk or drive her wherever she wants to go, some uniform cops [...] looking in.

1. (also arm, put the strong arm on someone) to attack from behind by choking the victim with one’s forearm before robbing them.

1928		C. Panzram Journal of Murder in Gaddis & Long (2002) 44: I put the arm on him and we dragged him through the fence [...] and robbed him.
1930		C.R. Shaw Jack-Roller 85: My buddy, being an old ‘jack-roller,’ suggested ‘jack-rolling’ as a way out of the delima. So we started to ‘put the strong arm’ on drunks.
1933		Ersine Und. and Prison Sl. 15: arm, v. To rob by applying a gilligan hitch. ‘They armed the mark in back of the ginmill.’.
1937		‘Boxcar Bertha’ Sister of the Road (1975) 261: I’d take him in, and ‘put the arm on him,’ holding him tight round his neck while my pals would go to it and rob him.
1942		N. Algren Never Come Morning (1988) 125: I gave him the arm alone. I’m rugged as a bull.
1947		W. Motley Knock on Any Door 193: Just before the fellow hit the bridge, they put the arm on him.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 169/1: Put the arm on. 1. To assault by seizing the victim’s head in a crushing arm-lock.
1966		F. Elli Riot (1967) 17: Get ready to put the arm on him.

2. (also lay the arm on) to pressurize with threats of violence, to extort ‘protection’ payments, to beg for money, to blackmail.

1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks n.p.: Giving the arm, beating up a racketeer who is attempting to muscle in on a district.
1938		D. Runyon ‘Butch Minds the Baby’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 341: You take us to him at once, or [...] I will have to put the arm on somebody.
1947		B. Schulberg Harder They Fall (1971) 246: Some old pug [...] put the arm on him for a sawbuck or two.
1953		B. Behan Scarperer (1966) 40: You might put the arm on him for a few quid.
1959		W. Brown Teen-Age Mafia 61: Maybe we could send them around to put the arm on this Connie bim.
1965		(con. 1940s) B. Behan Confessions 149: You should [...] put the arm on the guy for two thousand francs.
1965		C. Brown Manchild in the Promised Land (1969) 427: He’d found out by putting the arm on some junkies.
1977		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Black Gangster (1991) 126: If we put the arm on some of these guys.
1981		J. Ellroy Brown’s Requiem 15: Here I was, four hundred miles away, putting the arm on some counter-culture bimbo.
1986		R. Campbell In La-La Land We Trust (1999) 193: I’m home and not feeling too good when Sheila calls and lays the arm on me. I won’t call it blackmail, but I don’t know what else you’d call it.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 434: Kick loose with who put the arm on you.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 211: Ever since you learned I’ve been getting over at Hobby you’ve been putting the arm on me.
1992		Bentley & Corbett Prison Sl. 91: Bulldoggin’ […] verbal harassment as well as a physical and or verbal intimidation […] (Archaic: put the arm on, put the nuts on).
1993		C. Hiaasen Strip Tease 138: She got herself tangled in a blackmail [...] the idea was to put the arm on the congressman.
2001		N. Green Shooting Dr. Jack (2002) 267: A guy used to work for you was trying to con some bad guys, and then tries to put the arm on you two.
2013		T. Dorsey Riptide Ultra-Glide 217: We put the arm on them, so they kill two birds with one rock.

3. to reveal scandalous facts about someone, to inform on.

1938		W. Winchell ‘On Broadway’ 17 May [synd. col.] The French Intelligence Bureau ‘put the arm on’ Stalin’s enemies for him.
1996		H. Roth From Bondage 133: You don’t mean to tell me one o’ those fat I-talian ladies [...] is goin’ to step back heah and put the ahm on us.

4. to make an arrest.

1931		D. Runyon ‘The Old Doll’ s House’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 69: Johnny Brannigan, the plain-clothes copper, puts the arm on Lance McGowan.
1944		D. Runyon Runyon à la Carte 142: Do you not just put the arm on me for it? Do you not just state you have an order for my arrest?
1950		Life 4 Dec. 44: Its cops pounded up tenement stairways, putting the arm on mop-shakers and airmailers.
1955		E. Hunter ‘See Him Die’ in Jungle Kids (1967) 102: They expected to just walk in and put the arm on him.
1962		B. Veeck Veeck — as in Wreck 189: [A] St. Louis railroad section detective put the arm on him because he answered the description of a young guy who had held up a liquor store.
1968		J. Alard He Who Shoots Last 214: ‘He’s on da lam. [...] I know demons wot ’ud put d’arm on ya fer bein’ in the same suburb as a joker wots on da scoot’.
1971		T. Thackrey Thief 371: Cold balls for a minute. Puckered asshole. Cotton mouth. Cops? Could they have put the arm on ... Oh Jesus!
1979		F. Norman Too Many Crooks Spoil the Caper 210: I told yuh to get ’ere at five o’clock and put the arm on Otto.
2004		E. Weiner Drop Dead, My Lovely (2005) 51: If they put the arm on me all I had to say was, ‘I have his wife’s permission.’.

(US) to talk incessantly at someone, to harangue.

1852		C.A. Bristed Upper Ten Thousand 149: Ludlow was fairly talked off his feet by the voluble patois of Löwenberg.
1887		Lantern (N.O.) 23 July 3: He can talk yer arm off, he talks so much.
1895		L. Powers Farmer Hayseed 92: He has a fixed lingo about wheat, cotton, and silver, and upon these themes he can in his way talk your arm off.
1920		S. Lewis Main Street (1921) 42: Great fellow for chinning. He’ll talk your arm off, about religion or politics or books.
1937		G. Rector Dine at Home with Rector 30: A learned judge of my acquaintance will talk your arm off about his initiation into its mysteries.
1948		Pop. Science Jan. 165/2: He’ll talk your arm off about it if you let him.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 72: I’ve had one hell of a day, listening to Delbert. He can talk your leg off.
1968		P.M. McGrady Youth Doctors 113: People talk your arm off about their operations. They'll gleefully propagandize their latest diet .
1974		R. MacDonald Instant Enemy 22: That boy will talk your arm off [...] His main subject is how the country is going to the dogs.
1984		B.B. Mohs Amazing Mr Mohs 215: Les Helgesen, seller of silos, and businessman extraordinary who will talk your arm off in five minutes.
1998		M. Jensen Daddy by Default 82: We don't bite, though Peg, here, will talk your arm off.
2012		G.A. Warner Springtime in Savannah 298: Charlie and Elmer will talk your arm off.

to force someone to do something against their will, often ironic.

[1907		Gem 16 Mar. 6: We can twist Meredith’s tail till he howls. Savvy?].
1947		Sun (Sydney) 26 oct. 15/3: Sir frerick [...] sees fit to to fly in ‘The Canberra’ ... so will I if they twist my arm.
1953		Word for Word: Ency. of Beer (Whitbread & Co.) 36/2: Twist one’s arm, to ‘persuade’ one to have a drink, when no persuasion is needed. A facetious action and remark.
1963		‘Nino Culotta’ Gone Fishin’ 164: ‘How about we take him out some Sunday, an’ show him how to catch real fish? Hire a boat, eh, an’ make a day of ut?’ ‘Yer twisted me arm,’ Dennis said. ‘Next Sunday?’.
1986		F. Taylor Auf Wiedersehen Pet Two 175: I knew we’d twist the bastard’s arm all right.
1999		C. Dexter Remorseful Day (2000) 188: ‘You’re twisting my arm,’ said Morse. ‘Make it three pints of Guinness,’ said Lewis.

second-rate, inferior, bad.

1937–84		Partridge DSUE.
1958		F. Norman Bang To Rights 31: Some [books] are right under the arm, stand on me.

a short measure of beer.

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.