Definition of "lam" in English

verb

1. (transitive, informal) To beat or thrash.

   • 1930, Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, Mule Bone, Act II, Scene 2, in The Collected Works of Langston Hughes, Volume 5: The Plays to 1942: Mulatto to The Sun Do Move, edited by Leslie Catherine Sanders, Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2002, p. 102, An' fo' I knowed it, he done picked up that bone an' lammed me ovah de head wid it.

2. (intransitive, dated, slang) To flee or run away.

   • [Gangster running away:] Batman and Robin! Let's lam!

noun

1. (slang) A flight or escape.

   • on the lam

noun

1. The twenty-third letter of the Arabic alphabet, ل (l). It is preceded by ك (k) and followed by م (m).