▪ I. booby, n.1
(ˈbuːbɪ)
Also 8 boobee, 9 boobie.
[probably ad. Sp. bobo, used both in the sense of ‘fool’ and ‘booby’ (the bird), of doubtful origin. (The Ger. bube, MHG. buobe, is used frequently in the sense of ‘fool, lubber’; but connexion with it is hardly possible: its LG. form is boeve, boef.)]
1. a. ‘A dull, heavy, stupid fellow: a lubber’ (J.); a clown, a nincompoop. Also, spec. a cry-baby (dial. or children's colloq.).
| 1599–1603 Patient Grissil 48 [Welshman loq.] Then, mage a pooby fool of Sir Owen. God's plude, shall! 1616 Fletcher Cust. Country i. ii, Cry, you great booby. 1687 T. Brown Saints in Upr. Wks. 1730 I. 74 Such a booby as thou art, pretend to dispute the precedence? 1711 Steele Spect. No. 113 ¶3, I bowed like a great surprised Booby. 1776 Johnson in Boswell (1831) III. 352 We work with our heads, and make the boobies of Birmingham work for us with their hands. 1824 W. Irving T. Trav. I. 260, I was so awkward a booby that I dared scarcely speak to her. 1891 R. P. Chope Dial. Hartland, Dev. 29 Booby, a big child given to crying. 1945 E. Waugh Brideshead Revisited i. viii. 189 ‘Poor simple monk,’ I thought, ‘poor booby.’ 1959 I. & P. Opie Lore & Lang. Schoolchildren x. 186 Gloucestershire children comment: you babby, big baby,..booby, [etc.]. |
b. spec. The last boy in a school class, the dunce.
| 1825 Ld. Cockburn Mem. i. 4, I never got a single prize, and once sat boobie at the annual public examination. 1849 C. Brontë Shirley III. iv. 75 He was the booby of..grammar school. |
c. attrib.
| 1728 Young Love Fame ii. (1757) 95 The booby father craves a booby son. 1748 Richardson Clarissa xxxi. I. 205 Never was there booby squire that more wanted it [improvement]. 1818 Scott Hrt. Midl. iv, There is not a boy on the booby form but should have been scourged for such a solecism in grammar. |
d. to beat the booby: see beat v.1 41. e. Shortened f. booby-hutch: a lock-up or cell. slang.
| 1938 F. D. Sharpe Sharpe of Flying Squad 329 Booby or Booby Hutch, the cell. |
2. A name for different species of gannet, esp. Sula fusca.
| 1634 Sir T. Herbert Trav. 10 One of the Saylers espying a Bird fitly called a Booby, hee mounted to the top-mast and tooke her. The quality of which Bird is to sit still, not valuing danger. 1707 Sloane Jamaica I. 31 Boobies..so called of Seamen because they do not stir from you, but suffer themselves to be catch'd by the hand. 1819 Byron Juan ii. lxxxii, At length they caught two boobies, and a noddy. 1860 Gosse Rom. Nat. Hist. 83 The booby and the noddy sit on the bare rock in startling tameness. |
3. Comb., as booby-hack U.S. = booby-hut; booby hatch, (a) (Naut.), a smaller kind of companion which lifts off in one piece, in use for merchantmen's half-decks; (b) a lock-up or gaol (U.S. slang); (c) a home for the insane (U.S. slang); booby-hut, a hooded sleigh used in New England; booby-hutch, a small clumsy cart or carriage used in some parts of England; see also quot. 1881; also, a lock-up or cell; a police station; booby-prize, a prize awarded in ridicule or fun to the player with the lowest score; booby-trap, a kind of practical joke in vogue among schoolboys and others (see quots.); also Mil. colloq., a harmless-looking object concealing an explosive charge, designed to go off if the object is disturbed; hence as v. trans., to set with a booby-trap; so booby-trapped ppl. adj.
| 1888 Boston Daily Globe (Farmer), They collided with Crowley's *booby hack, knocking the horse down and demolishing the front of the vehicle. |
| 1840 R. Dana Bef. Mast xxxiv. 130 The sky-light and *booby-hatch [are] put on. 1859 G. W. Matsell Vocabulum 13/2 Booby-hatch, station-house. 1883 Chamb. Jrnl. 141 The after or booby-hatch was covered with a network of lashings. 1897 Ade Pink Marsh 3 They'd have him in the booby-hatch in about two hours. 1923 Time 10 Mar. 15/3 Liane,..whose specialty is driving lover after lover to ruin, death, or the booby-hatch. 1931 G. Irwin Amer. Tramp & Underworld Slang 33 Booby Hatch, a police station or village gaol. 1936 Wodehouse Laughing Gas xi. 111 What, tell people you're me and I'm you. Sure we could, if you don't mind being put in the booby-hatch. |
| 1720 Weekly Jrnl. 4 June 1623/2 Not a Raw bon'd Jade, or a *Booby-Hutch in City and Suburbs but will be hacked out to City Apprentices. 1818 H. More Hist. Mr. Fanton Stories (1830) I. 10 All that multitude of coaches, chariots, chaises, vis-a-vis, booby-hutches, sulkies, etc. 1881 Evans Leicestersh. Gloss. (E.D.S.), Booby-hutch, a hand-barrow; a small deep cart; a sentry-box; any movable ‘coop’ or ‘hutch’ of any kind intended for the use of a single human occupant. The carts drawn by dogs before the passing of Martin's Act were often so called. 1889 Barrère & Leland Dict. Slang I. 161/1 Booby-hutch (thieves), the police-station. 1938 Booby hutch [see sense 1 e]. |
| 1889 Puck (U.S.) 17 July 378/1 Into infinitesimal shreds he tears A beautiful *Booby Prize. 1900 E. T. Fowler Farringdons iii. 55 Your prize would have been no better than a booby-prize. 1929 G. Stowell Hist. Button Hill i. 64 The incorrigible Mr. Denworthy presented as a booby-prize a small sample bottle of Worcester sauce. |
| 1850 F. E. Smedley Frank Fairlegh iii. 28 The construction of what he called a ‘*booby-trap’. 1868 Chamb. Jrnl., A ‘booby-trap’..it consisted..of books, boots, etc., balanced on the top of a door, which was left ajar, so that the first incomer got a solid shower-bath. 1882 Sat. Rev. 4 Nov. 600 Perpetually on the alert for booby-traps. 1917 E. F. Wood Note-Bk. Intelligence Officer xix. 271 ‘Booby’ traps were sprinkled about the country in the form of bombs. 1918 P. Gibbs From Bapaume to Passchendaele 4 The enemy left..‘booby-traps’ to blow a man to bits or blind him for life if he touched a harmless-looking stick or opened the lid of a box. 1943 Illustr. London News 1 May 483 Doors and windows are easily booby-trapped. 1959 ‘M. Derby’ Tigress iii. 130 The ugly foreground, mined and booby-trapped and ambushed. |
▪ II. booby, n.2
(ˈbuːbɪ)
= bubby1. slang (orig. U.S.).
| 1934 H. Miller Tropic of Cancer 315 She was lying on the divan with her boobies in her hands. 1968 Guardian 2 Sept. 4/6 The characters were constantly referring to her large bosom (even descending to calling them ‘big boobies’). |
▪ III. ˈbooby, v. rare—1.
[f. booby n.1]
In to booby about: to go about like a booby.
| 1807 W. Irving Salmag. (1824) 53 Those brainless pert bloods..Who lounge and who loot, and who booby about. |