subs. (B. E. and GROSE: still colloquial).—Dress: spec. ‘State dress’ (GROSE). Hence as adj. (and adv.) = spruce, neat, WELL-GROOMED (q.v.); IN SAD TRIM = ‘Dirty, Undrest’; A TRIM LAD = ‘a spruce, neat, well-trickt Man’ (B. E.); TO TRIM UP (or FORTH) = to dress, make clean and neat, set out: spec. to shave or clip the beard.

1

  1530.  PALSGRAVE, Langue Francoyse, 762. I TRYMME, as a man dothe his heare or his busshe…. TRYMME my busshe, barber, for I intende to go amongest ladyes to-day.

2

  1595.  SHAKESPEARE, Romeo and Juliet, ii. 1.

        Young Adam Cupid, he that shot so TRIM.
    Ibid. (1601), Henry VIII., i. 3.
  Cham.          What a loss our ladies
Will have of these TRIM vanities!
    Ibid. (1608), Antony and Cleopatra, v. 2.
I found her TRIMMING UP the diadem
On her dead mistress.

3

  1659–69.  PEPYS, Diary, I. 187. Before I went to bed the barber come to TRIM me and wash me, and so to bed, in order to my being clean to-morrow.

4

  1696.  Nomenclator [NARES]. Their fronts or partes which are in sight, being smooth and TRIM on both sides, their naturall substance remaineth rough and unhewne, to stuffe and fill up the middest of a wall, etc.

5

  Verb. (old colloquial).—1.  To call to account, reprove, thrash; hence, TO TRIM ONE’S JACKET = to drub, ‘dress down,’ dust one’s coat; TRIMMING = a beating, scolding, or jacketing; TRIMMER = (a) a severe disciplinarian, also of things, and (b) see infra (GROSE).

6

  c. 1520.  The Wife Lapped in Morrelles Skin, 717 [HAZLITT, Remains of the Early Popular Poetry of England, iv. 209].

        For I will TRIM thee in thy geare,
Or else I would I were cald a Sow.

7

  d. 1536.  TYNDALE, Works, ii. 313 [T. L. KINGTON-OLIPHANT, The New English, i. 431. The priests propose to trim Queen Katherine].

8

  1611.  CHAPMAN, May-Day, iii. 2. I’faith we shall TRIM him betwixt us.

9

  1772.  BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 157.

        But after that, I know it fact,
He fifty blust’ring bullies thwack’d …
He TRIMM’D their jackets ev’ry one.

10

  1773.  FOOTE, The Bankrupt. [A severe leading article is called a TRIMMER].

11

  1778.  SHERIDAN, The Rivals, ii. 1. Fag. So! Sir Anthony TRIMS my master; he is afraid to reply to his father; then vents his spleen on poor Fag.

12

  1778.  BURNEY, Evelina, xlvii. His mouth was wide distended into a broad grin, at hearing his aunt give the beau such a TRIMMING.

13

  18[?].  HOOD, Trimmer’s Exercise.

        You ’ve been spelling some time for the rod,
  And your jacket shall know I ’m a TRIMMER.

14

  2.  (old).—To cheat; hence TRIMMING = ‘Cheating People of their Money’ (B. E.): cf. SHAVE.

15

  3.  (venery).—To deflower, to possess a woman: see RIDE: also TO TRIM THE BUFF. Hence UNTRIMMED = virgin, undeflowered.

16

  1596.  SHAKESPEARE, King John, iii. i. 209.

          Const.  … The devil tempts thee here,
In likeness of a new UNTRIMMED bride.

17

  1611.  CHAPMAN, May-Day, iv. 4. Twenty to one she is some honest man’s wife of the parish, that steals abroad for a TRIMMING, while he sits secure at home, little knowing, God knows, what hangs over his head.

18

  c. 1620.  FLETCHER and MASSINGER, The False One, ii. 3. An she would be cool’d, sir, let the soldiers TRIM her.

19

  1772.  BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 110.

        And he …
Has liberty to take and TRIM
The buff of that bewitching brim.
    Ibid., 112.
Let him with NELL play tit for tat,
And TRIM her till I eat my hat.

20

  See TRIMMER.

21