shag-boy
English
Etymology
From hogboy, from Old Norse haugr (“cairn; mound”) + bui (“dweller; tennant”). Cognate with Scots hogboon.
Noun
shag-boy (plural shag-boys)
- (Lincolnshire) A ghost or goblin.
- 1882 August 1, “From the Heart of the Wolds”, in The Cornhill Magazine, volume 46, number 2, page 232:
- Ghosts, bogies, and the supernatural generally have utterly vanished from this commonplace district before schools and newspapers. Even an old lady more than ninety years old said to us, "Fairies and shag-boys! lasses are often skeart at them, but I never saw none, though I have passed many a time after dark a most terrible spot for them on the road at Thorpe."
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Synonyms
- shag-foal