polliwog, pollywog dial. and U.S.
(ˈpɒlɪwɒg)
Forms: α. 5 polwygle, 7 porwig(g)le, 9 porriwiggle, purwiggy, pollywiggle, pollywoggle. β. 6 polwigge, 7 polewigge, po(o)lwig, 9 polliwig, polly-wig, polliwog, pollywog.
[ME. polwygle, f. poll n.1 + wiggle v. The forms polwig, etc., are either shortened from polwygle, or formed with the dial. wig vb. to wag.]
a. A tadpole.
| α c 1440 Promp. Parv. 408/1 Polwygle, wyrme. 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. 329 The spawne is white, contracting by degrees a blacknesse, answerable..unto the porwigle or Tadpole, that is, that animall which first proceedeth from it. 1823 E. Moor Suffolk Words & Phrases 288 Pollywiggle, the tad-pole—in Norfolk called potladle. a 1825 Forby Voc. E. Anglia, Purwiggy, a tadpole. 1855 Robinson Whitby Gloss., Porriwiggles, tadpoles and other tortuous animalcula in water. 1881 S. Evans Evans's Leicestershire Words (new ed.) 216 Pollywig, or pollywiggle,..a tadpole. ‘Poddywig’ is, I think, the commoner form. 1933 H. G. Wells Bulpington of Blup ii. 45 These things you call pollywiggles and pollywoggles. 1965 East Anglian May 242/1 Tadpoles were..pollywiggles. |
| β 1592 Nashe 4 Lett. Confut. (1593) 63 Thou hast a prety polwigge sparrows taile peake. 1601 Holland Pliny I. 265 Some little mites of blackish flesh, which they call Tadpoles or Polwigs. a 1825 Forby Voc. E. Anglia, Polliwigs. 1835–40 Haliburton Clockm. (1862) 321 Little ponds..nothing but pollywogs, tadpoles, and minims in them. 1862 Lowell Biglow P. Ser. ii. 80 ‘Lord knows’, protest the polliwogs, ‘We're anxious to be grown-up frogs’. 1892 Working Men's Coll. Jrnl. Oct. 124 In this pond dwells the pollywog, loggerhead, or tadpole. |
b. U.S. As a political nickname.
| 1854 L. Oliphant Episodes (1887) 47 Filibusters, polly⁓wogs, and a host of other nicknames. 1864 Sala in Daily Tel. 27 Sept., ‘The slimy machinations of the pollywog politicians have usurped the government of our city’, said Poer. |