malkin
Americannoun
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an untidy woman; slattern.
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a scarecrow, ragged puppet, or grotesque effigy.
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a mop, especially one made from a bundle of rags and used to clean out a baker's oven.
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a cat.
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a hare.
Etymology
Origin of malkin
1200–50; Middle English: literally, little Molly, equivalent to Mal, variant of Molly Mary + -kin
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.
More than half of New York's film critics actually cited Bass's black stalking malkin as far and away the best thing in Walk on the Wild Side.
From Time Magazine Archive
As if this were not enough, malkin became the baker’s clout to clean ovens with.
From Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature by Bardsley, Charles W.
The most probable derivation of the word is, that malkin is a diminutive of mal, abbreviated from Mary, now commonly written Moll.
From Notes and Queries, Number 234, April 22, 1854 A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc. by Various
Hence, by successive changes, malkin or maukin might mean a dirty wench, a figure of old rags dressed up as a scarecrow, and a mop of rags used for cleaning ovens.
From Notes and Queries, Number 234, April 22, 1854 A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc. by Various
The cove's so scaly, he'd spice a malkin of his jazey: the fellow is so mean, that he would rob a scare-crow of his old wig.
From 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue by Grose, Francis
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.
