bilbo
noun
a long iron bar or bolt with sliding shackles and a lock, formerly attached to the ankles of prisoners.
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bilbo
1 American
[bil-boh]
/ ˈbɪl boʊ /
noun
-
bilboes
plural
bilbo
2
American
[bil-boh]
/ ˈbɪl boʊ /
noun
Archaic.
-
bilboes
plural
Bilbo
3
American
[bil-boh]
/ ˈbɪl boʊ /
noun
bilbo
British
/ ˈbɪlbəʊ /
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bilbo1
First recorded in 1550–60; earlier bilbow < ?
Origin of bilbo2
1585–95; short for Bilboa blade sword made in Bilboa (variant of Bilbao )
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.
See Examples For:
Sir Iohn, and Maister mine, I combat craue Of this same laten bilbo.
From The Merry Wives of Windsor The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] by John Glover
I wear a bilbo by my side, as you can see.
From Micah Clarke His Statement as made to his three grandchildren Joseph, Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Castaldo calls the bilbo a “fated aspic,” upon the edge of which his “eye-balls crack to look,” and makes a raving exit from the stage, to a roaring laugh from the audience.
From Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, September 5, 1841 by Various
A Spanish bilbo, to lock the English by the legs.
From City Scenes or a peep into London by William Darton
I have brought you a couple of dictionaries; let us see if your highness can find out the Latin for bilbo.
From The Lady of Lyons by Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron Lytton
Offers poured in, and it sold to perhaps the most fitting possible buyer outside Bilbo Baggins himself: real estate agent Michael Libow.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 21, 2025
The story is set in the fantasy world Middle-earth and follows the hobbit Bilbo Baggins on a quest to find treasure.
From BBC ● Aug. 6, 2025
Mr. Dawood wrote in a Facebook post last year from a trip in Iceland, quoting Bilbo Baggins from “The Fellowship of the Ring.”
From New York Times ● Jun. 21, 2023
A: The rings of power takes place in the Second Age, which is thousands of years before the events of the Third Age, which most people know — Frodo and Bilbo and all of that.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 1, 2022
‘I’ll do as I choose and go as I please,’ said Bilbo obstinately.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
Them apostles was fishermen, d’ye see, and the fishermen and longshore folk always was more peaceable and quieter-like than us deep-sea bilboes.
From Athelstane Ford by Allen Upward
One was a man who obstinately refused to go to meeting, and after being warned several times was clapped into the bilboes by the tythingman.
From Ben Comee A Tale of Rogers's Rangers, 1758-59 by M. J. (Michael Joseph) Canavan
Soon another colonist felt the bilboes for “selling peeces and powder and shott to the Indians,” ever a bitterly-abhorred and fiercely-punished crime.
From Curious Punishments of Bygone Days by Alice Morse Earle
They saw two great strong-boxes filled to the brim with iron chains, broken cutlases, rusty bilboes, and rock; a fool's treasure in truth.
From The Pirate Woman by Aylward Edward Dingle
A slang term for the ship's irons or bilboes.
From The Sailor's Word-Book An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, including Some More Especially Military and Scientific, but Useful to Seamen; as well as Archaisms of Early Voyagers, etc. by Sir Edward Belcher
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.
