thimblerig vs thimblerigger

thimblerig

noun
  • A game of skill which requires the bettor to guess under which of three small cups (or thimbles) a pea-sized object has been placed after the party operating the game rapidly rearranges them, providing opportunity for sleight-of-hand trickery; a shell game. 

  • One operating such a game. 

verb
  • To cheat in the thimblerig game. 

  • To cheat (someone) by trickery. 

thimblerigger

noun
  • One who cheats by thimblerigging, or tricks of legerdemain. 

How often have the words thimblerig and thimblerigger occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )