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  1. booby love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A person regarded as stupid.
  2. n. Any of several tropical sea birds of the genus Sula, resembling and related to the gannets.
  3. n. Vulgar Slang A woman's breast.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A stupid fellow; a dull or foolish person; a lubber.
  2. n. The pupil at the foot of a class; the dunce of the class or of the school.
  3. n. In progressive euchre, the player who has failed most conspicuously in the game.
  4. n. The name of various species of brown and white gannets, birds of the family Sulidœ, genus Sula. The common booby of the United States is Sula leucogastra, a well-known species of the South Atlantic coast. Others are the red-footed booby, Sula piscator, and the blue-faced booby, S. cyanops, found on many coasts and islands of the warmer parts of the world.
  5. n. In New England, a hack on runners; a sleigh kept for hire.
  6. Of or pertaining to a booby or boobies; foolish; stupid.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A stupid person.
  2. n. by extension Any of various large tropical seabirds from the genera Sula and Papasula in the gannet family Sulidae, traditionally considered to be stupid.
  3. n. slang a woman’s breast

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A dunce; a stupid fellow.
  2. n. A swimming bird (Sula fiber or Sula sula) related to the common gannet, and found in the West Indies, nesting on the bare rocks. It is so called on account of its apparent stupidity -- unafraid of men, it allows itself to be caught by a simple and undisguised approach. The name is also sometimes applied to other species of gannets; as, Sula piscator, the red-footed booby; and Sula nebouxii, the blue-footed booby.
  3. n. A species of penguin of the antarctic seas.
  4. adj. Having the characteristics of a booby; stupid.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. small tropical gannet having a bright bill or bright feet or both
  2. n. an ignorant or foolish person

Etymologies

  1. 17th Century. Spanish bobo, from Latin balbus ("stammering"). (Wiktionary)
  2. Probably Spanish bobo, from Latin balbus, stammering.Perhaps alteration of obsolete English bubby. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

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Lists

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Comments

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  • hernesheir Railroad telegraphers' term for the interrogative "Who will pay brokerage?" --US Railway Association, Standard Cipher Code, 1906 Jan 20, 2013

  • yarb But there were some boobies and bumpkins there, who, by their intense greenness, must have come from the heart and centre of all verdure.

    - Melville, Moby-Dick, ch. 13 Jul 23, 2008

  • brtom ... the son an awkward booby, reared up and spoiled at his mother’s apron-string.
    Goldsmith, She Stoops, I Jan 8, 2007

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‘booby’ has been looked up 2472 times, added to 24 lists, commented on 3 times, and has a Scrabble score of 12.