hob-thrush, hob-thrust Obs. exc. dial.
Also 7– hob-thurst.
[f. Hob n.1+ (perh.) thurse, ON. þurs giant, goblin.]
1. A goblin: see quots. Now dial.
| 1590 Tarlton News Purgat. (Shaks. Soc.) 55 One of those Familiares Lares..as Hob Thrust, Robin Goodfellow and such like spirites..famozed in every olde wives chronicle for their mad merrye prankes. 1611 Cotgr., Loup-garou,..also, a Hobgoblin, Hob-thrush, Robin-good-fellow. 1713 Steele Guardian No. 30 ¶4 Our own rustical superstition of hob-thrushes, fairies, goblins, and witches. 1825 Brockett, Hobthrust, a local spirit, famous for whimsical pranks. 1867 Murray's Handbk. Yorksh. 228 Hob Thrush, or ‘Hob o' th' Hurst’ was a woodland and mountain spirit. 1877 Holderness Gloss., Hob-thrust..a good-natured goblin who assists servant-maids in their early morning work, but in a state of nudity. |
† b. ? Lycanthropy. Obs. (App. an erron. transl. of F. loup-garou lycanthrope, through a misunderstanding of Cotgrave's definition.)
| 1658 tr. Bergerac's Satyr. Char. xi. 47, I cure sick Persons of the Hob-thrush, by giving them a blow with a forke just between the two eyes. |
c. Applied opprobriously to a rustic. dial.
| 1682 H. More Annot. Glanvill's Lux O. 91 That any ignorant rural Hobthurst should call the Spirit of Nature..a prodigious Hobgoblin. 1854 Bamford Dial. S. Lanc. 188 (Lanc. Gloss.) ‘Theau great hobthurst.’ |
2. (In full hob-thrush louse). A wood-louse. dial.
| 1828 Craven Dial., Hob-thrush-louse, Millepes. 1873 Swaledale Gloss., Hobthrush, a wall-louse. |