bang up meaning: definition, quotations

bang up

adjalso spelled bang-up

Idiomatic Good, superior, excellent.

Often hyphenated

verb

Informal To damage.

Informal To put someone in prison, or into their individual cell.

He was so drunk that the police banged him up for the night.
A combination of having too many plates spinning, ill-health, being banged up for debt (1822-23) and bankruptcy all served to impede James' progress, although the Central Junction Railway - a 16-mile horse-drawn tramway between Stratford and Moreton (Gloucestershire) - did materialise in 1826.2021 December 29, Stephen Roberts, “Stories and facts behind railway plaques”, in RAIL, number 947, page 56:

Slang To inject a recreational drug.

I knew some fellows who banged up, I mean heroin, but I kind of stayed away from it.1971, Army Digest, volume 26, page 31:

adj

Colloquial Especially good; wonderful; superb.

It is true that certain kinds of documents, especially sham hawkers’ licenses, may be had in the provinces, at prices suited to the importance of their contents, or to the probable gains of their circulation; but all the ‘regular bang-up fakes’ are manufactured in the ‘Start’ (metropolis), and sent into the country to order, carefully packed up, and free from observation.1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, published 1861:
[…] he had dined with the Hickses ("a bang-up show -- they're really lances-you wouldn't know them!"), and had met there Lansing […]1922, Edith Wharton, The Glimpses of the Moon:

2 more examples

“When we get to Nashville, let's find some nice place to eat, and let's have the best bang-up chicken dinner in town!”1988, Janice Holt Giles, The Enduring Hills:
Hobbes: But then the aliens take over the Earth. Calvin: Well, it's not like the grownups have done such a bang-up job.1995 October 14, Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes (comic):

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — authors: page histories for bang up and bang-up.