Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A small European fresh-water fish, Gobio fluviatilis, of the family Cyprinidœ. It is easily caught, and is used for bait. See cut under Gobio.
  • noun Hence A person easily cheated or insnared.
  • noun A bait; an allurement; something used to deceive or entrap a person; a cheat; a lie.
  • Resembling a gudgeon; foolish; stupid.
  • noun The large pivot of the axis of a wheel.
  • noun In machinery, that part of a horizontal shaft or axle which turns in the collar.
  • noun In ship-building: One of several clamps, of iron or other metal, bolted to the stern-post of a ship or boat for the rudder to hang on.
  • noun One of the notches in the carrick-bits for receiving the metal bushes in which the spindle of a windlass traverses.
  • noun A metallic pin used for securing together two blocks or slabs, as of stone or marble.
  • noun A piece of wood used for roofing.
  • noun Eleotris coxii, a gobioid fish of New South Wales.
  • To insnare; cheat; impose on.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Zoöl.) A small European freshwater fish (Gobio fluviatilis), allied to the carp. It is easily caught and often used for food and for bait. In America the killifishes or minnows are often called gudgeons.
  • noun What may be got without skill or merit.
  • noun A person easily duped or cheated.
  • noun (Mach.) The pin of iron fastened in the end of a wooden shaft or axle, on which it turns; formerly, any journal, or pivot, or bearing, as the pintle and eye of a hinge, but esp. the end journal of a horizontal.
  • noun (Naut.) A metal eye or socket attached to the sternpost to receive the pintle of the rudder.
  • noun See under Ball.
  • transitive verb rare To deprive fraudulently; to cheat; to dupe; to impose upon.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A type of bearing: a circular fitting, often made of metal, which is fixed onto some surface and allows for the pivoting of another fixture.
  • noun nautical Specifically, in a vessel with a stern-mounted rudder, the fitting into which the pintle of the rudder fits to allow the rudder to swing freely.
  • verb To deprive fraudulently; to cheat; to dupe.
  • noun A small freshwater fish, Gobio gobio, that is native to Eurasia.
  • noun Any of various similar small fish of the family Eleotridae, often used as bait.
  • noun An idiot.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun small slender European freshwater fish often used as bait by anglers
  • noun small spiny-finned fish of coastal or brackish waters having a large head and elongated tapering body having the ventral fins modified as a sucker

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English gojune, from Anglo-Norman goujon, from Late Latin, gobionem, accusative of gobio, from Latin gobius ("gudgeon")

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Examples

  • The ordinary fry is the normal issue of parent fishes: the so-called gudgeon-fry of small insignificant gudgeon-like fish that burrow under the ground.

    The History of Animals 2002

  • "Nothing very wonderful in that," said Jack; "the common gudgeon, which is the stupidest fish to be found in fresh water, would do that much."

    Willis the Pilot Paul Adrien

  • Send him me down, or else a _horn_ one, which I believes in desperate; but send me something before Tuesday, and I will send you P.O.O. Horn minnow looks like a gudgeon, which is the pure caseine.

    Alton Locke, Tailor and Poet An Autobiography Charles Kingsley 1847

  • The little gudgeon was standing woebegone, holding his limp purse.

    The Sky Writer Geoff Barbanell 2010

  • Believe me when I say that I have seen the seamy side of every alley in Town looking for a castaway gudgeon willing to part with his finery.

    Sexy Beast IV Kate Douglas, Deanna Lee, Dawn Thompson 2008

  • They caught eight gudgeon, small bony fish that were good only for soup, but Jenny caught a perch and Rossetti an enormous pike.

    The Wayward Muse Elizabeth Hickey 2007

  • They caught eight gudgeon, small bony fish that were good only for soup, but Jenny caught a perch and Rossetti an enormous pike.

    The Wayward Muse Elizabeth Hickey 2007

  • They caught eight gudgeon, small bony fish that were good only for soup, but Jenny caught a perch and Rossetti an enormous pike.

    The Wayward Muse Elizabeth Hickey 2007

  • The old lady was right; and I swallowed the bait which her Ladyship had prepared to entrap me as simply as any gudgeon takes a hook.

    The Memoires of Barry Lyndon 2006

  • Neckam, as are likewise the lamprey (of which King John is said to have been very fond), bleak, gudgeon, conger, plaice, limpet, ray, and mackerel.

    Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine 2006

Comments

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  • "Two pintles and two gudgeons: fittings for a boat's rudder."

    —Steven Callahan, Adrift, 61

    "A metal socket in which the pintle of a rudder turns freely in either direction."

    A Sea of Words, 222

    See also goodgeon for another (older) usage.

    May 15, 2008

  • "O my jolly dapper boy, thou hast given us a gudgeon; I hope to see thee Pope before I die."

    -a steward in "Gargantua and Pantagruel"

    April 26, 2009

  • "To swallow gudgeons before th'are catch'd,

    And count their chickens before ere th'are hatch'd.

    Samuel Butler (1612-1680), Hudibras pt. ii, c.2., line 923.

    September 20, 2009

  • The pintle and gudgeon comprise a simple bearing.

    September 20, 2009

  • "gudgeon, shchmudgeon!", said the curmudgeon, and stalked out in high dudgeon.

    September 20, 2009

  • You give me such schadenfreudgeon, sionnach!

    September 24, 2009