Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a miser, also a surly person.

1602		Dekker Satiromastix I ii: blunt: Nay prethee deare Tucca, come you shall shake — tucca: Not handes with great Hunkes there.
1611		Davies of Hereford Scourge of Folly 8: Like one, to ten (like Huncks) he them doth spoile, But ten to one hee’s but a Beast the while.
1630		T. Randolph Muses’ Looking-Glass II iv: Think you I meant all that I told your Father? No, ’twas to blind the eyes of the old Huncks.
1638		R. Brathwait Barnabees Journal (1778) 91: There the Beares were come to Town-a; Two rude Hunks, ’tis troth I tell ye.
1648		R. Herrick ‘Upon Hunks’ Hesperides 201: Huncks ha’s no money (he do’s sweare or say) About him, when the Taverns shot’s to pay.
1658		Mennis & Smith ‘Mr Smith to Cap. Mennis’ Wit Restor’d (1817) 121: Or if you misse him there, go look In company of Hunkes Sir Fook.
1676		Wycherley Plain-Dealer V ii: [He] makes a very pretty show in the World, let me tell you; nay, a better than your close Hunks.
1680		Dryden Spanish Fryar I ii: A jealous, covetous, old hunks.
1694		J. Eachard (trans.) Plautus’s Comedies preface a 4: A Pumice-stone is not half so dry as that old Huncks.
1708		W. Taverner Maid the Mistress Epilogue: An injur’d and neglected Wife forsooth, Prefers her jealous Hunks to vigorous Youth.
1712		Spectator No. 264 n.p.: Irus has... given all the intimations he skilfully could of being a close hunks with money [F&H].
1731		Prisoners Opera 23: Fondle your bags like a miserly Hunks.
1736		Swift ‘The Legion Club’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 228: You would gladly see the Hunks / In his Grave, and search his Trunks.
a.1742		W. Somerville ‘The Fortune Hunter’ Canto III in Chalmers Eng. Poets (1810) XI 221/1: This rich old hunks, as Woodcock wise, Was call’d the younker to advise.
1771		Foote Maid of Bath in Works (1799) II 209: That [...] money-loving, water-drinking, mirth-marring, amorous old hunks.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1790		Derby Mercury 30 Sept. 1/2: A rich old hunks is he [...] Great Paragon of skin-flint laws.
1794		Sporting Mag. Aug. IV 289/1: I am glad you have tricked the old hunks.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1825		Egan Life of an Actor 90: Hastily old Hunks exclaimed, ‘How?’.
1831		Navy at Home II 241: The captain is the stingiest hunks in the squadron.
1832		J.K. Paulding Westward Ho! I 19: What, shut up my doors, like a miserable hunks [...] and pretend not to see strangers as they pass?
1841		Dickens Old Curiosity Shop (1999) 62: What does it come to? That you become the sole inheritor of the wealth of this rich old hunks.
1851		Melville Moby Dick (1907) What of it if some old hunks of a sea-captain orders me to get a broom and sweep down the decks?
1857		Trollope Three Clerks (1869) 31: I am sure he is a cross old hunks, though mamma says he’s not.
1863		G.A. Sala Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous 166: He is the meanest little hunks that ever skinned a flea.
1874		M. Clarke Term of His Natural Life (1897) 171: I should have been left a quarter of a million in money, but the old hunks who was going to give it to me died before he could alter his will.
1882		Mat. Police Gaz. 14 Jan. n.p.: [pic. caption] How a senile old hunks dreams his life away in scenes of oriental voluptuousness.
1886		M.E. Braddon Mohawks I 157: ’Twas old Hunks’s lawyer sang the praises of young Miss’s beauty.
1894		A. Morrison Tales of Mean Streets (1983) 164: Stingy old ’unks! [...] A-goin’ about buyin’ ’ouses, an’ won’t lend ’is own son ten shillin’s!
1895		‘’Arry on Derby Day’ in Punch 1 June 258/1: And now all along of old hunks [...] I’m making out bills for hair-trunks.
1896		‘Frederick Benton Williams’ (H.E. Hamblen) On Many Seas 225: Oh, dear! Oh, dear! there lay the old hunks flat on his back on a cask : his arms extended, his right hand grasping an empty tin pot, his old gray beard.
1909		D. Stewart Dead Man’s Gold in Illus. Police News 27 Feb. 12/4: ‘I want to know when [...] my father left you. I’ve been told that the old hunks called’.
1914		E. Pugh Cockney At Home 70: ’Ow about old Hunks, for instance?
1922		Joyce Ulysses 153: Made a big deal on Coates’s shares. Ca’canny. Cunning old Scotch hunks.

2. (US) a worthless, good-for-nothing person.

1838		T. Haliburton Clockmaker II 12: Many’s the lark you and I have had together in Slickville, when old Hunks [...] thought we was abed.
1909		Carr & Chase in ‘Word-List From Aroostook’ in DN III:v 412: hunks, n. A general term of reproach. ‘Old lazy hunks! get out of this.’.
1919		Marvel 1 Mar. 6: Haik was always a duffing sort of duffer, and the bounder will never grow out of it, the hunks!
1960		E. North Nobody Stops Me 30: She’ll be all right when she’s slept it off. Actually the old hunx ain’t a bad sort.