or bunco-game, bunco-steerer, subs. phr. (American).—1. A swindling game played with cards or dice, not unlike three card monté. [From the Italian banco, a bench or bank.] Hence as verb. (or TO PLAY THE BUNCO-GAME) = to work the confidence-trick; and in a less offensive sense, TO BLUFF; whence to rob; to cheat, to swindle. Also BUNCO-CASE = a confidence-trick BUNCO-MAN (or BUNCO-STEERER) = a swindler; a confidence-trick man.
1876. BESANT and RICE, The Golden Butterfly, xxxi., 235. The BANCO STEERER … will find you out the morning after you land in Chicago or Saint Louis. He will accost you—very friendly, wonderful friendly—when you come out of your hotel, by your name, and he will remind you—which is most surprising, considerin’ you never set eyes on his face before—how you have dined together in Cincinnati, or it may be Orleans, or perhaps Francisco, because he finds out where you came from last. And he will shake hands with you; and he will propose a drink; and he will pay for that drink. And presently he will take you somewhere else, among his pals, and he will strip you so clean that there won’t be left the price of a four-cent paper to throw around your face and hide your blushes. In London … they do … the confidence trick.
1883. Philadelphia Times, 289, 2, 2. Tom’s method of BUNCO was the well-known lottery game.
1887. Cincinnati Enquirer. Detectives Kirby and Funk last night spotted J. P. Ramby, the person accused of having BUNKOED Ex-county Commissioner Stephens, of Greene County, out of 2,300 dols. in Xenia recently.
1888. Chicago Daily Inter Ocean, April 14. John Brothers, a farmer living near Canton, Ohio, was BUNKOED out of $2,000 to-day by two sharpers who escaped.
1888. Chicago Daily Inter Ocean, Feb. 14. Andrew Carnegie fell into the hands of a BUNCO-STEERER in Pittsburg, Saturday night, but was rescued by a detective before he lost anything.
1896. LILLARD, Poker Stories, 165. Hoping to BUNCO the bone-man to make a foolish play.
1898. BINSTEAD, A Pink ’Un and a Pelican, 8. Men would rather be BUNKOED and bested by a polished, well-dressed villain … than be taken out for a whole evening by one who makes no attempt to disguise his moderate circumstances.
