slang. [Origin uncertain.
As a surname of plebeian origin (app. from Jug; cf. Jenkins, Tomkins, Dickens, etc.), Juggins is known in 1604 (Worcestersh.); it is given to a Lancashire collier in Disraeli’s Sybil. But it does not appear whether or how far this is the source of the slang term; some take the latter as a fantastically perverted derivative of mug ‘greenhorn,’ found 1861 in Mayhew, London Lab., III. 203, and having also a derivative muggins (but this not certainly earlier than juggins).]
A simpleton, one easily ‘taken in’ or imposed upon.
[1845. Disraeli, Sybil, III. i. II. 8. ‘Juggins has got his rent to pay and is afeard of the bums,’ said Nixon; ‘and he has got two waistcoats!’]
1882. Punch, 7 Jan., 3/1. ’Arry.… The openin’ of a new era. What ’s that? Second ’Arry. ‘Openin’ of a new ’Earer?’ Why, a Telephone o’ course, you Juggins! Ibid., 23 Dec., 292/1. ‘How pale your face, In the wan light of the——’… Wan light of the what, you Juggins?
1884. Jas. Greenwood, in Daily Tel., 25 Aug. ‘A Lucky Shilling.’ Well, here’s good luck to him as a soft-hearted juggins, and may we soon come across another!
1889. Besant, Bell of St. Paul’s, I. 292. The pigeon … exists no longer. In his place is the Juggins.
1894. Doyle, Round the red Lamp, 19. Why, you juggins … there never was an operation at all.
1894. Stevenson & L. Osbourne, Ebb-tide, 211. Well, you are a juggins!
