hobbledehoy
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of hobbledehoy
1530–40; variant of hoberdyhoy, alliterative compound, equivalent to hoberd (variant of Roberd Robert) + -y 2 + -hoy for boy ( b > h for alliteration; see hob 2)
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“I know a lot of these young men who are at a somewhat awkward stage, like Trollope’s hobbledehoy, caught somewhere between childhood and adulthood,” says Schine.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 10, 2023
For Anthony, "a hobbledehoy of 19, without any idea of a career," Frances obtained a clerkship in the London Post Office.
From Time Magazine Archive
In Louisiana an Elson Reader was banned because of this Mother Goose couplet: The gentleman rides gallop-a-trot, gallop- a-trot; The farmer rides hobbledehoy, hobble- de-hoy.
From Time Magazine Archive
"Aye, and have ever since she was in pinafores, and I a hobbledehoy in Master Wytheby's school."
From The Master of Appleby A Novel Tale Concerning Itself in Part with the Great Struggle in the Two Carolinas; but Chiefly with the Adventures Therein of Two Gentlemen Who Loved One and the Same Lady by Lynde, Francis
A ragged hobbledehoy stood on the Vanderbilt grounds at Biltmore, mouth open but silent, watching a gardener at work.
From Our Southern Highlanders by Kephart, Horace
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
