dial. Also 7 elegug, helegug, 9 eligoog. [Derivation unknown: Prof. Rhŷs and the Rev. Silvan Evans do not know it as Welsh.] A local name (in South Pembrokeshire) applied to certain sea-birds, the Common Guillemot, the Puffin, and the Razor-bill.
1662. Ray, Three Itin., III. 176. This name, elegug, some attribute to the puffin, and some to the guillem.
1676. Willughby, Ornithologia, 244. Anas Artica [i.e., the Puffin] Wallis meridionalibus circa Tenby oppidum Guldenhead, Bottle-nose & helegug.
1867. Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Eligugs.… Called also razor-bills.
1883. Wirt Sikes, in Harper’s Mag., Feb., 350/1. Thousands of gulls, razor-bills, and puffins—the birds called locally [in Pembroke] ‘eligoogs.’
