hobnail
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English
Etymology
hob + nail. The oldest attestation is in William Shakespeare, but he likely did not coin the term.
Noun
hobnail (plural hobnails)
- A short nail with a thick head, typically used in boot soles.
- (obsolete) A yokel; a rustic.
- 1645 March 14 (Gregorian calendar), J[ohn] M[ilton], Colasterion: A Reply to a Nameles Answer against The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce. , [London?: s.n.], →OCLC:
- Next, the word Politician is not us'd to his maw, and therupon he plays the most notorious hobbihors, jesting and frisking in the luxury of his non-sense with such poor fetches to cog a laughter from us, that no antic hobnaile at a Morris, but is more hansomly facetious.
- 1859, George Meredith, chapter 9, in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel. A History of Father and Son. , volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC:
- There lay Tom; hobnail Tom! a bacon-munching, reckless, beer-swilling animal! and yet a man …
Coordinate terms
Derived terms
Translations
short nail with a thick head
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Verb
hobnail (third-person singular simple present hobnails, present participle hobnailing, simple past and past participle hobnailed)
- To fit with hobnails.
- a machine for the hobnailing of shoes
- (transitive, archaic) To tread down roughly, as with hobnailed shoes.
- 1875, Tennyson, Queen Mary:
- Your rights and charters hobnailed into slush.
References
- ^ Culpeper, Jonathan, Gillings, Mathew (2022 August 31) “Five myths about Shakespeare’s contribution to the English language”, in Arts + Culture, The Conversation, retrieved 2022-10-16
