gallows bird


nounInformal.
  1. a person who deserves to be hanged.

Origin of gallows bird

1
First recorded in 1775–85

Words Nearby gallows bird

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use gallows bird in a sentence

  • Then the boy ran back and picked up the kid, and took it to the Black gallows bird.

    The Lilac Fairy Book | Andrew Lang
  • This gallows-bird was the one great writer of his age and country, and initiated modern literature for France.

    Familiar Studies of Men and Books | Robert Louis Stevenson
  • We are now after the assassin, who you may see has got off at this place, for here is my ladder which the gallows-bird has used.

  • Why, thou gallows-bird—thou jail-rat—thou friend of the hangman and his customers!

    Kenilworth | Sir Walter Scott
  • Such a gallows-bird, with so many bad habits, would be arrested anywhere, and then what good should I get of my income?

British Dictionary definitions for gallows bird

gallows bird

noun
  1. informal a person considered deserving of hanging

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012