Also 8 buggybow, 8– bugabo. [? f. BUG + BOO int.: cf. Cornw. bucca-boo under BUCCA, also BOGLE-BO, and bug-boy in BUG sb.1 (Possibly a Celtic compound, in which case cf. OF. Beugibus, Bugibus, name of a demon.)] A fancied object of terror; a bogy; a bugbear.
[c. 1200. Aliscans, 1141 (Anciens Poètes de la France (1870), X. 35). Et puis d’ infer iras o Bugibu, Aveuc ton Dieu Mahom[et] et Cahu.]
1740. Xmas Entertainm., ii. Of Hobgoblins, Rawheads, and Bloody-bones, Buggybows.
1843. Poe, Premat. Burial, Wks. 1867, I. 338. No fustian about church-yards, no bugaboo tales.
1870. Lowell, Among My Books, Ser. II. (1873), 128. If the sins themselves were such wretched bugaboos as he has painted.
b. cant. ‘A sheriff’s officer’ (Grose’s Dict. Vulg. Tong., 1823); ‘a tally-man,’ a weekly creditor (ibid.); and similar senses.
1827. Lytton, Pelham, lxxix. Many a mad prank … which I should not like the bugaboos and bulkies to know.
