nim

verb

1. (obsolete, transitive)To take or seize.

   “Ich cham a Cornysche man, al[e] che can brew; […] Nym me a quart of ale, that iche may it of sup.”

   “Then Alfyne to the court Of Syleuma doth come, And Pandauola in her armes Her Alfyne hath up num And kisseth him full ofte […]”

   “Gryndall carefully sets out the difference between seizing or nimming a bird (an outcome that would constitute a partly successful flight) and taking the bird outright: 'And if your Hawke noume [nim, seize] a foule, and the foule breake from her, she hath discomfited many feathers of the foule, and is broken away: but in kindly speech you shall say, your hawke hath noumed or seased a foule, and not taken it'.”

2. (archaic, slang, transitive)To filch, steal, pilfer.

   “They'll question Mars, and, by his look, Detect who 'twas that nimm'd a cloak;”

   “Nimming and niftering whativver he can try his fists on.”

   “But while he fell in some brave exploit, you, I suppose, being provident rogues and thieves of discretion, were on the sure lay, pilfering little thefts among the mob, fearfully nimming a cloak or rifling some old woman's bulk of a stock to set up a piece-broker's shop.”

   “They nim a pig, a duck, or fowl.”

   “Shall we go nim a horse, Tom,—what dost think? […] Nim? yes, yes, yes, let's nim with all my heart; I see no harm in nimming, for my part; […] Were it my lord mayor's hourse—I'd nim it first. [...A horse] they stole, or, as they called it, nimmed, Just as the twilight all the landscape dimmed. […] What is most likely, is that both these elves Were, in like manner, halter-nimmed themselves.”

3. (UK, dialectal, intransitive)To walk with short, quick strides; trip along.

   “The old lady does nim along. 1949, Wilfrid J. Halliday, Arthur Stanley Umpleby, The White Rose Garland of Yorkshire Dialect Verse and Local and Folk-lore Rhymes (quoting Irene Sutcliffe), page 111: Ah had set myself doon where the aums meet aboon,”

noun

1. (uncountable)A game in which players take turns removing objects from heaps.
2. (alt-of, alternative)Alternative form of neem (“Indian tree”).