Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A goblin in English folklore, often appearing in the shape of a large dog and believed to portend imminent death or misfortune.
Wiktionary
- n. UK A legendary monstrous black dog with huge teeth and claws.
- n. UK A ghost, wraith, hobgoblin, elf, or spirit.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A goblin, in the shape of a large dog, portending misfortune.
Etymologies
- Disputed; perhaps burh-ghest, town-ghost, or German Berg-geist (mountain spirit) or Bär-geist (bear-spirit). (Wiktionary)
- bar (perhaps from barrow2) + ghest, ghost (dialectal variant of ghost). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The barghest has a kinsman in the Rongeur d'Os of Norman folklore.”
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 "Banks" to "Bassoon"
“She's created a world so nuanced and believable, I half-expect to see barghest hounds on my next trip to the mall.”
“Yes, there was one vampire and I am started to get a bit tired of vampires at this point, especially since I was never a big fan of them in the first place, but this supernatural world also contains kelpies, selkies, gnomes, djinn, nahual, a barghest, and nagas.”
“This was mainly due to Jane herself, the barghest Anyan, and the plethora of supernatural which fortunately was not limited to just the typical vampires and werewolves.”
“Anyan, the barghest, is one of those mysterious characters and there are a few intriguing hints about him that are dropped here and there.”
“Let me see... there was the barghest, and although it kept creating illusions of itself to fool us, and I wasted a Flame Strike on it, we defeated it eventually.”
“Well, one barghest, but the point was that there was the illusionary one and then there was the real one and there were elves and I shot at the elves and they fell over and then Duncan got attacked and fell off the roof and Miriam grabbed him and I healed him as best as I could and then we ran like crazy.”
“And at one point it was that a wier-wier, one of the solitary water-birds of this region, uttered its ouphe and barghest cry, flying from somewhere near into some darker recess within the woods.”
“The barghest was essentially a nocturnal spectre, and its appearance was regarded as a portent of death.”
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 "Banks" to "Bassoon"
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘barghest’.
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nouns
enfleurage, fautor, mafia, haslet, chopine, sea-gate, cantillation, formicary, go-devil, Gongorism, mamzer, mazarine and 147 more...
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Gene Wolfe
Please contribute your favorite words from any of Gene Wolfe’s books to this prize-winning list.
In case you come across words in this list which are too commonplace to fit in, please ...gallipot, roost, badelaire, oblesque, execration, dhole, amschaspand, arctother, chalcedony, penitence, asimi, autarch and 839 more...
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Mythical Beings
mermaid, manticore, fairy, brownie, dwarf, elf, leprechaun, selkie, gremlin, puck, pixie, genie and 97 more...
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ghost
This is Ghost List 2 ( the kind that go 'boo!' ) :P
( open list )
more:
http://www.wordnik.com/lists/macabrephantom, spectral, specter, spectre, spooky, poltergeist, haunt, spirit, banshee, cryptic, shadow, phantasm and 311 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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Dogs in Myth
Cerberus, hellhound, Fluffy, Anubis, barghest, Sirius, Argos, cynocephaly, waheela, kelpie, kitsune, Reynard and 25 more...
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The Devil and His Imps
Names of 'the Devil himself, the devils his "flaming ministers", household goblins, rural demons, bogles, sprites, and fairies of all kinds' mentioned in Charles P.G. Scott's 'The Devil and His Imp...
devil, devilet, deviling, dablet, black angel, black man, black bear, black bull, black dog, bogle, bogie, boggard and 128 more...
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Fictional beasties
elf, gnome, dwarf, sprite, troll, fairy, nymph, imp, brownie, sasquatch, yeti, wookiee and 574 more...
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Setting the Scene: Dark and Dreary
Words that lend to the dark and dreary atmosphere of gothic literature.
dark, dreary, shroud, shrouded, veiled, skeleton, skeletal, dead, death, murky, gloomy, lugubrious and 274 more...
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MEDUC 599MS
Sample list for presentation!
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persnickety parlance
behoove, ebullient, insouciant, insipient, froth, quandary, quixotic, tendril, maktub, furrow, furl, anastrophe and 1076 more...
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whigmaleeries
naumachy, skeesicks, barghest, catoblepas, bunyip, bellwether, gadabout, footle, aestival, brannigan, brabble, kilkenny cats and 6 more...
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folklore/mythology
kelpie, hobgoblin, manticore, selkie, chupacabra, korrigan, chimera, doppelganger, bunyip, banshee, basilisk, mara and 20 more...
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Mythical creatures
dragon, griffin, unicorn, chimera, centaur, minotaur, cameleopard, zahhak, azhi dahaka, ouroborus, draco, leviathan and 77 more...
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mythology things
ephydriad, empusa, cynocephalus, barghest, auf, acephal, altitonant, oracle
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words i think are funny
i love unique and funny words so anything here amuses me or i think is cool
scaud, squint, olfaction, squally, polliwog, barghest, jubilee, snarky, nosh, kerfuffle
Tweets
Looking for tweets for barghest.

soccer girl i think my dog is a barghest Aug 24, 2011