▪ I. gudgeon, n.1
(ˈgʌdʒən)
Forms: 5 gogen, (-eorn), -yn, gojon(e, gojoun, -une, 6 gogeon, -ion, gougeon, gojen, 6–7 gudgin, -ion, 7 gougin, ? goojon, 6– gudgeon.
[ME. gojon, gogen, a. F. goujon (14th c. in Littré):—L. gōbiōn-em, gōbio, by-form of gōbius goby. Cf. It. gobione.]
1. A small European fresh-water fish (Gobio fluviatilis), much used for bait.
| c 1425 Voc. in Wr.-Wülcker 642/20 Hic gobio, gojune. c 1430 Two Cookery-bks. 60 Goions fryid. a 1450 Fysshynge w. angle (1883) 15 Ye schall angle..for the wexen Roche the bleke and the gogyn & þe Roffe with a lynne of ii herys. c 1481 Caxton Dialogues iv. 12 Loches, gogeorns. 1558 Act 1 Eliz. c. 17 §4 Places where Smelts, Loches, Minnies, Bulheads, Gudgions or Eels, have been used to be taken. 1570 Levins Manip. 163/34 A Gogeon, fish, gobio. 1620 Venner Via Recta iv. 81 The Gudgion, and other such little fishes are of pleasant taste. 1622 Peacham Compl. Gent. xxi. (1634) 254 The Gudgin, Roch and Dace, which are Fish of eager bite, and soonest deceived. 1651–7 T. Barker Art of Angling (1820) 38 The greedy Gudgeon doth love the Gild taile. 1653 Walton Angler xi. 203 The Gudgion is an excellent fish to eat. 1727 Swift Art Polit. Lying Wks. 1755 III. i. 120 When there is too great a quantity of worms, it is hard to catch gudgeons. 1736 Bailey Househ. Dict. 535 Gudgeons must be scaled, gutted and washed, then floured and put into the hot lard. 1780 Cowper Progr. Err. 483 Minnows and gudgeons gorge the unwholesome food. 1802 Bingley Anim. Biog. (1813) III. 82 The food of the Gudgeon consists of aquatic plants, worms, the larvae of water insects and the spawn of fish. 1873 G. C. Davies Mount. & Mere xi. 91 Gudgeons had to be caught for bait. |
† b. Applied to fishes of the genus
Gobius or family
Gobiidæ: see
goby.
sea gudgeon, the Black Goby or Rock-fish.
Obs.| 1584 Cogan Haven Health clxxvii. (1636) 163 Gogion..is found as well in the sea as in fresh waters. 1661 Lovell Hist. Anim. & Min. 205 Sea Gudgions, called Paganelli, and by some Sea Cobs, are a most sound, light, wholesome, and nourishing meat. 1769 Pennant Zool. III. 175 The Black Goby... Sea Gudgeon. Rock-fish. Ibid. 308 Aristotle mentions the gudgeon in two places; once as a river fish, and again as a species that was gregarious: in a third place he describes it as a sea fish. 1774 Goldsm. Nat. Hist. (1776) VI. 307 The Gobius or Gudgeon. |
2. fig. a. One that will bite at any bait or swallow anything: a credulous, gullible person.
| 1584 R. Scot Discov. Witchcr. xii. xvi (1886) 208 They would doo no harme, were it not to make fooles, and catch gudgins. 1657 M. Hawke Killing is M. 51 They will not swallow this Impostors principles of knavery, which none but fools and gudgeons will. 1701 Cibber Love Makes Man i. i. (1705) 8 Did ever two old Gudgeons swallow so Greedily? 1727–8 Mrs. Pendarves Let. to Mrs. A. Granville in Mrs. Delany's Life & Corr. 165 You are a mere wag, sister, to think London ladies such gudgeons as to bite at anything. 1786 Wolcot (P. Pindar) Bozzy & Piozzi ii. 11 In vain at glory gudgeon Boswell snaps. 1809 W. Irving Knickb. i. iv. (1849) 53 A conjecture..too tempting not to be immediately snapped at by the gudgeons of learning. 1839 in Spirit Metrop. Conserv. Press (1840) I. 141 The stupid gudgeons who swallowed the Hanover lie in 1837. |
b. A bait, something swallowed greedily or credulously: in
phr. to gape for gudgeons,
to swallow a gudgeon,
to give a gudgeon.
| 1579 Lyly Euphues (Arb.) 97 But what fish so euer you be, you haue made both me and Philautus to swallow a Gudgen. 1581 G. Pettie Guazzo's Civ. Conv. i. (1586) 42 b, To force us to beleeve that which is false, which is nothing else but to give us a gudgin, and flout us. 1586 J. Hooker Girald. Irel. in Holinshed II. 91/2 Doo you thinke that James was so mad, as to gape for gogions, or so ungratious, as to sell his truth for a piece of Ireland? 1598 Florio, Sciarpellone, a grosse ly, an vnluckie tale, as we say a gudgeon or lying for the whetstone. 1606 Sir G. Goosecappe i. iii. in Bullen O. Pl. III. 21 Here's a most sweet Gudgeon swallowed, is there not? 1607 T. Walkington Opt. Glass Ep. Rdr. 2, I know right well thou usest not to gape after gougins. 1620 Shelton Quix. IV. xxix. 221 The Gullings and Gudgeons that he had given him. 1665 J. Webb Stone-Heng (1725) 122 Readers would never be induced to swallow such a Gudgeon, as that seven-penny Men should be fed with Venison. 1892 Nat. Observer 23 July 235/1 It has educated Hodge into an increased readiness to gorge any gudgeon that may be offered him. |
3. attrib. and
Comb., as in
gudgeon-dole,
gudgeon-fish,
gudgeon-fishing,
gudgeon-gift,
gudgeon-prince,
gudgeon-rake,
gudgeon-swim. Also
gudgeon-like adj.| 1599 Nashe Lenten Stuffe 61, I haue distributed *gudgeon dole amongst them, as God's plenty, as any stripling of my slender portion of witte farre or neere. |
| 1611 Florio, Ghiozzo,..some take it for a *Gudgeon-fish. |
| 1727–41 Chambers Cycl. s.v. Fishing, *Gudgeon-Fishing. |
| 1889 ‘J. Bickerdyke’ Bk. All-round Angler i. 99 The Thames method of *Gudgeon-fishing. |
| 1557 Tottel's Misc. (Arb.) 156 The fisher man doth count no care, To cast hys nets to wracke or wast, And in reward of eche mans share A *gogen gift is much imbrast. |
| 1792 Wolcot (P. Pindar) Ep. to Sir W. Hamilton Wks. 1812 III. 188 *Gudgeon-like prepared to bite. |
| a 1704 T. Brown Praise Poverty Wks. (1730) I. 90 This is a bait they often throw out to such *gudgeon-princes as will nibble at it. |
| 1787 Best Angling (ed. 2) 59 When you angle for them, be provided with a *gudgeon-rake, with which rake the ground every ten minutes which gathers them together. |
| 1889 ‘J. Bickerdyke’ Bk. All-round Angler i. 99 By the side of the *gudgeon-swim. |
▪ II. gudgeon, n.2 (
ˈgʌdʒən)
Forms: 5
goggyn,
gogion,
gogoyne,
gudyon,
gugeoune,
goyvn, 5–6
gogeon,
gojon(e, 6
gog(g)in,
gogon,
-yn(e,
goudgen,
gudging,
gugen,
-yne,
gujen, 7
gudgin,
gug(g)ion, 7–8
gudgion, 8–9
googing, 6–
gudgeon.
[a. OF. gojon, gogon, goujon, gougon (12–13th c. in Hatz.-Darm.); perh. an application of prec. n., though connexion has been suggested with F. gond hinge (cf. the 14th c. form goignon).] 1. A pivot, usually of metal, fixed on or let into the end of a beam, spindle, axle, etc., and on which a wheel turns, a bell swings, or the like; in recent use more widely applied to various kinds of journals and similar parts of machinery.
| 1400 Churchw. Acc. Wigtoft, Linc. (Nichols 1797) 195 Payd to ed. Smyth, for a gudyon and kays. 1408 Durham Acc. Roll in Eng. Hist. Rev. XIV. 518 Soluta..pro..ii gogoynes ferri..emptis pro fine del axeltre rotae aquaticae. c 1440 Promp. Parv. 201/2 Goione of a poleyn (MS. Harl. 2274 goyvn off a polene) vertibulum, C.F. cardo. 1555 Richmond. Wills (Surtees) 86 Item a gogon for a possenet, jd. 1555 Ludlow Churchw. Acc. (Camden) 62 For mendynge gugyne, and settynge upright the secound belle..xijd. 1587–8 in Swayne Sarum Churchw. Acc. (1896) 136 Mending of a Goudgen of the great bell. 1634 J. Bate Myst. Nat. & Art (1654) 52 The gudgins of this wheel must be set to turn in strong brasse sockets. 1688 R. Holme Armoury iii. 462/1 The Guggions, great Iron pins put in the Head stock, for the Bell to turn with. 1762 Franklin Lett. Wks. 1887 III. 202 The spindle, which is of hard iron,..is made to turn on brass gudgeons at each end. 1787 Winter Syst. Husb. 296 Iron plates, in which the gudgeons of the fore wheel are placed. 1805 Brewster in Ferguson's Lect. I. 82 note, The extremities of an axle or spindle..are called gudgeons when the wheels are large. 1825 J. Nicholson Operat. Mechanic 47 The gudgeons of a water-wheel should never rest on the wall of the building. It shakes it. 1839 Ure Dict. Arts 750 The gudgeons..move in brass bushes fixed upon iron supports. 1884 Blackmore Tommy Upm. I. 275 He would lend them a spare wheel-barrow, if they would put new gudgeons in. |
2. The ring or ‘eye’ in the ‘heel’ of a gate which turns on the hook or pintle in the gate-post.
| 1496 Nottingham Rec. III. 291 For a gogion to þe Town Hall dore. 1737 Bracken Farriery Impr. (1756) I. 353 In the same Manner as we fix the Gudgeons of a Door in Stone, by melting Lead into the Cavities. 1886 in Cheshire Gloss. |
3. Naut. a. A metal socket in which the pintle of a rudder turns.
b. One of ‘the notches made in the carrick-bits for receiving the metal bushes wherein the spindle of a windlass works’ (Smyth
Sailor's Word-bk. 1867).
| 1558 W. Towrson in Hakluyt Voy. (1589) 124 Our pinnesse broke one of the gudgeons of her rudder. 1626 Capt. Smith Accid. Yng. Sea-men 3 The Carpenter..is to haue the..rudder-irons called pintels and gudgions. 1723 Lond. Gaz. No. 6224/5 The Middle Gudgeon of her Rudder broken off. 1769 Falconer Dict. Marine (1780), Googings,..certain clamps of iron bolted on the stern-post of a ship, whereon to hang the rudder, and keep it steady. 1815 Hist. J. Decastro I. 313 Madam Stickleback..turned round in it [her bed] as if Madam Stickleback's body moved upon a gudgeon and pintle exactly in the middle of her bed. 1874 Thearle Naval Archit. 77 Sometimes the braces or gudgeons for the rudder are forged to the post. |
† 4. ? A wedge or block (of metal).
Obs.| 14.. Siege Jerusalem 26/467 A which of white seluere; wal[w]ynde þer-ynne On four goions of gold, þat hit fram grounde bar. 1488 Inv. in Tytler Hist. Scot. (1864) II. 393 Item a grete gugeoune of gold. |
5. A metallic pin used for securing together two blocks or slabs of stone, etc.
| 1873 Spon Workshop Rec. Ser. i. 387/2 Marble workers mount and fasten their works upon plaster mixed with a third-part of dust... These are joined together by cramps and gudgeons of iron and copper. |
6. attrib., as
gudgeon end,
gudgeon-pin,
gudgeon-plate.
| 1839 A. Bywater Sheffield Dial. 26 Dustah kno what sooat on a thing 't north powl is, Jerra? J. Hah sloik e doo. Its't gudgen end o 't world axeltree, wot sticks aht. 1879 Man. Artillery Exerc. iii. §7. 101, 6 and 7 hand the gun roller to No. 1, who places it in the lower steps of the gudgeon plates. 1891 Times 12 Oct. 10/6 Previous to leaving the persistent heating and scoring of her gudgeon-pins had been effectually overcome by the substitution of wrought-iron case-hardened pins for the original ones made of steel. |
▪ III. gudgeon, v. (
ˈgʌdʒən)
[f. gudgeon n.1] a. intr. To play the gudgeon (see
quot. 1785).
b. trans. To cheat, defraud
of, delude
into.
| 1785 Grose Dict. Vulg. Tongue, Gudgeon, to swallow the bait, or fall into a trap, from the fish of that name which is easily taken. 1787 Generous Attachment I. 197 Mr. and Mrs. Angle..will have the satisfaction of seeing..every person in Bath gudgeoned into an idea of their importance. 1826 Scott Woodst. xvi, To be..gudgeoned of the opportunities which had been given you. |