corn-baby
a literary perversion of kirn-baby = harvest-home doll (baby 2); originated by an erroneous conjecture of Brand, and retained by some writers on folklore, but never in popular use.
| 1777 Brand Pop. Antiq. (1810) 341 The Northern word [Kern-baby] is plainly a corruption of Corn Baby, or Image. 1825 T. D. Fosbroke Encycl. Antiq. (1843) II. 694/1 The old Gauls used to parade a figure of Berecynthia over the fields..This is the Kern or Cornbaby. 1890 J. G. Frazer Gold. Bough I. iii. 344 In the North of England the last handful of corn was cut by the prettiest girl and dressed up as the Corn Baby or Kern Baby. |