What did the word “cute” mean in the 1730’s?

Answer 1

As an adjective, it should have meant acute, clever:

Oxford English Dictionary:
1. Acute, clever, keen-witted, sharp, shrewd.

1731 BAILEY vol. II, Cute, sharp, quick-witted. 1756 W. TOLDERVY Two Orphans II. 39 ‘You may think as you please,’ said parson Drill; ‘but I take him to be a very cute one’. 1777 in F. BURNEY Early Diary (1889) II. 279, I didn't pity the man for having such a cute answer made him.
1840 DICKENS Barn. Rudge (1849) 26/1 ‘He will be a 'cute man yet’, resumed the locksmith. 1848 LOWELL Biglow P. Poems 1890 II. 47 Aint it cute to see a Yankee Take sech everlastin' pains [etc.]?

2. (orig. U.S. colloq. and Schoolboy slang.) Used of things in same way as CUNNING a. 6. Now in general colloq. use, applied to people as well as things, with the sense ‘attractive, pretty, charming’; also, ‘attractive in a mannered way’.

1834 C. A. DAVIS Lett. J. Downing 214 I'm goin' to show you about as cute a thing as you've seen in many a day. 1857 ‘PORTE CRAYON’ Virginia Illustr. ii. 166 ‘What cute little socks!’ said the woman. 1868 G. E. HUGHES in T. Hughes Mem. Brother (1873) 155 His study is awfully 'cute (= ‘tidy and full of knick-knacks’). 1879 F. R. STOCKTON Rudder Grange vi. 61 [The flat] was so cute, so complete. 1880 A. A. HAYES New Colorado (1881) vii. 97 The way that Smart Aleck hollered when we swung round some of them ‘cute’ curves. 1900 Daily News 15 Nov. 6/5 A small and compact wooden house, what the Americans would call ‘cute’. 1908 Daily Chron. 21 Apr. 3/3 American visitors who are used to wide rectangular streets are delightfully bewildered when I take them through sinuous byeways and tortuous alleys. They proclaim it ‘just too cute and lovely’. 1941 A. HUXLEY Grey Eminence ii. 18 The tiny boy..looking almost indecently ‘cute’ in his claret-coloured doublet and starched ruff. 1945 Time must have Stop vii. 77 A French accent so strong, so indecently ‘cute’, so reminiscent of the naughty-naughty twitterings of a Parisian miss on the English musical comedy stage. 1960 P. MORTIMER Sat. Lunch with Brownings 92 She's ever so cuteblue eyes. 1966 Amer. Speech XLI. 285 The style also gets cute at times, as when he writes that such adjectives as washable and non-shrinkable are ‘among the most..not-to-be-got-along-withoutable adjectives’.

Answer 2

It meant having business acumen, being hard to deceive, but easily able to spot a weakness in the person you are doing business with.

Answer 3

clever

Answer 4

fat