"B" Word Origins

bog

Scottish Gaelic

From Irish and Scottish Gaelic bogach, "soft, boggy ground," ultimately from a Celtic root meaning "soft."

bogan

Origin

Unknown. First appeared in Australia in the 1980s. Possibly in reference to supposedly unsophisticated people from remote outback places such as the Bogan River or Bogan Gate (cf. dubbo from Dubbo).

bogart

Origin · 1960

From actor Humphrey Bogart, whose on-screen habit of keeping a cigarette dangling from his lips gave rise to 1960s slang for hogging a shared joint instead of passing it along, later broadened to hogging anything.

bogatyr

Origin

Borrowed from Russian богаты́рь (bogatýrʹ), Old East Slavic богатꙑрь (bogatyrĭ), from a Turkic language, probably Khazar, from Old Turkic [script needed] (baɣatur, “hero”), from Proto-Turkic *bagatur (“hero”). Cognates include Turkish bahadır, Tatar баһадир (bahadir), Chuvash паттӑр (pattăr), Kyrgyz баатыр (baatır), Tuvan маатыр (maatır), Yakut баатыр (baatïr), Turkmen batyr, Middle Turkic baɣatur. Doublet of bahadur.

Bogdan

Greek

From Proto-Slavic Bogъdanъ, a calque of the Greek name Theodore, literally "gift of God."

bogey

Germanic

Likely related to bogle, an old word for a goblin or specter, itself possibly from a Welsh or Germanic root meaning "ghost" or "swollen thing."

bogeyman

Origin

From bogey plus the suffix -man.

boggard

Origin

Uncertain; occurring since 16th century in northern and north midlands British dialects; etymologically related to boggle, bogle, and obsolete bog (“a bugbear”); the first element perhaps ultimately a variant of bug (“goblin; terrifying thing; etc.”), and thus equivalent to bog + -ard (“augmentative suffix”).

boggart

Origin

Variant of boggard, recorded since 18th century. As a monster that feeds on fear, coined by British novelist J. K. Rowling in 1999 in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

bogged

Origin

The past participle of the verb bog.

bogger

Origin

From various senses of bog + -er.

boggle

Origin

Related to bogle, an old term for a goblin; the sense shifted from "startle as if seeing a ghost" to "confuse or overwhelm."

boghouse

Origin

From bog + house.

bogie

Origin

A dialectal word from Northern England of unknown origin, unrelated to "bogey" the ghost.

bogle

Origin

Uncertain; possibly cognate with English bug, or derived from Welsh bwgwly (“to terrify”).

Bogo

Origin

From the endonym of the Blin people of the Eritrean highlands.

bogosity

Origin

From bogus (“fake, phony”) + -osity.

bogue

Origin

Related to Spanish boga (“a ray-finned fish; Leporinus obtusidens”), from Late Latin bōca, bōx; Box vulgaris is an older name for Boops boops. Compare the obsolete term boce for this fish.

bogus

Origin · 1800

First recorded in 19th-century America as underworld slang for a device used to make counterfeit coins, later broadening to mean anything fake or of poor quality.

Bohannon

Irish

An anglicized form of Irish O Buadhachanain, from a word meaning "victorious."

bohdan

Origin

Borrowed from Ukrainian Богда́н (Bohdán).

Bohemia

Late Latin

From Late Latin Boiohaemum, combining the name of the Celtic Boii tribe with a Germanic word for "home."

bohemian

French

From French bohémien, originally meaning "person from Bohemia," later applied to unconventional artists, partly due to a (mistaken) association with Romani travelers thought to have come through Bohemia.

Bohm

German

From German Böhm.

boho

English

A shortening of bohemian, which came into English from French bohémien, originally meaning a native of Bohemia.

bohr

Danish

The unit is named after Danish physicist Niels Bohr, whose surname likely traces back to a Slavic or medieval personal name imported into Scandinavia.

bohunk

Origin

Probably Bohemian + Hungarian. Compare hunk, hunky, honky.

Boi

Portuguese

From Portuguese bumba-meu-boi, from boi, "bull."

boil

Old English

From Old English byle/byl, "swelling," related to Dutch buil and German Beule — both meaning "boil" or "swelling."

boiler

Origin

From boil plus the agent suffix -er.

boilerplate

Origin

From boiler + plate. First use appears c. 1793 in the periodical Star.

boiling

Origin

From boil plus the suffix -ing.

boing

Origin

An onomatopoeic word imitating a springy bouncing sound.

boink

Origin

An onomatopoeic coinage, similar to "bonk" and "yoink."

Bois

French

Borrowed from French Bois.

Boise

French

From French la rivière boisée, "the wooded river" — early French trappers named the area after the trees along the riverbanks.

boisterous

Old French

From Middle English boistous, "rough" or "crude" — its exact origin before that is uncertain, though it may trace back to an Old French word for something rough or uneven.

bok

Afrikaans

From Afrikaans bok, a doublet of the English word "buck."

boke

Origin

From Scots bock, attested from the 16th century.

boko

French · 1820

First recorded around 1820; possible sources include "beak" (nose), French beaucoup, or "poke" (as in poking one's nose in).

bola

Origin

Probably from Spanish bola.

bold

Old English

From Old English bald/beald, meaning brave or confident, going back to a very old Germanic root shared with Dutch boud and Swedish båld.

boldly

Old English

From Old English bealdlīċe, simply bold plus the adverb ending -ly.

boldness

Middle English

From Middle English boldnesse, from bold plus the noun-forming suffix -ness.

bolero

Spanish

From Spanish bolero, related to bola ("ball"), originally describing the dance.

Boleyn

Origin

A habitational surname derived from Boulogne-sur-Mer in France.

bolide

Origin

Borrowed from French bolide, from Latin bolis, from Ancient Greek βολίς (bolís, “missile, arrow, javelin”). Doublet of bolis.

Bolin

Origin

Archaic variant of Bollin.