bodge

See also: 'Bodge

English

WOTD – 27 November 2015

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /bɒdʒ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /bɑdʒ/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒdʒ

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle English bocchen (“to mend, patch up, repair”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps from Middle Dutch botsen, butsen, boetsen (“to repair, patch”) (Dutch botsen (“to strike, beat, knock together”)), related to Old High German bōzan (“to beat”), See beat; or perhaps from Old English bōtettan (“to improve, repair”), Old English bōtian (“to get better”). Compare botch. More at boot.

Perhaps from boggle.

Perhaps from botch (“patch, or a measurement of capacity equivalent to half a peck”). There is a hypothesis that bodges, defined as rough sacks of corn, closely resembled packages of finished goods the bodgers carried when they left the forest or workshop. Another hypothesis (dating from 1879) is that bodger was a corruption of badger, as similarly to the behaviour of a badger, the bodger dwelt in the woods and seldom emerged until evenings.

Other hypotheses include German Böttcher (“cooper (profession)”), a trade that uses similar tools), and similar Scandinavian words, such the Danish bødker. These words have similar origins to butt, as in water butt (“rain barrel”). Or possibly it may have been a derogatory term used by workers in furniture factories, referring to the men who worked in the woods that produced the “incomplete” chair parts. The factory workers would then take the output of that "bodged job" and turn it into a finished product.

The Oxford English Dictionary Supplement of 1972 has two definitions for bodger. One is a local dialect word from Buckinghamshire, for a chair leg turner. The other is Australian slang for bad workmanship. The etymology of the bodger and botcher (poor workmanship) are well recorded from Shakespeare onwards, and now the two terms are synonymous.

Verb

bodge (third-person singular simple present bodges, present participle bodging, simple past and past participle bodged)

1. (UK, Ireland) To do a clumsy or inelegant job, usually as a temporary repair; mend, patch up, repair.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:kludge

   • c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iv], page 153, column 1:

     We bodged again; as I have seen a swan

   • 1865, A book of characters, selected from the writings of Overbury, Earle, and Butler, Thomas Overbury and John Earle:

     All the actions of his life are like so many things bodged in without any natural cadence or connexion at all.

   • 2003, Laurence Meredith, Original Porsche 356: The Restorer's Guide:

     Some cars were neglected, others bodged to keep them running with inevitable consequences

   • 2007, Enric Roselló, The Restoration Handbook:

     Do not be satisfied with a bodged job, set yourself professional goals and standards

2. To work green wood using traditional country methods; to perform the craft of a bodger.
   • 1978, John Geraint Jenkins, Traditional Country Craftsmen, →ISBN, page 16:

     His father, grandfather and countless generations before him had obtained a living from chair bodging in the solitude of the beech glades.

   • 1989 May–June, John Birchard, “The artful bodger”, in American Woodworker, page 41:

     "Bodging is more a curiosity than a valid craft these days," says Don. "But experience in low-tech woodworking is also a good way for the beginner to start getting a feel for turning without having to make a huge investment in a modern lathe."

   • 2000, Beth Robinson Bosk, The New Settler Interviews: Boogie at the Brink, →ISBN:

     Which is no different than my chair bodging, in that I can go out into the woodland and do my work without having to be tied in to a village shop situation.

Derived terms

• bodgery

 

Translations

do a clumsy or inelegant job — see botch

Noun

bodge (plural bodges)

1. A clumsy or inelegant job, usually a temporary repair; a patch, a repair.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:workaround

   • 2011 February 22, Cory Doctorow, “Google App to help locate people in Christchurch quake”, in BoingBoing‎^[3], retrieved 2012-02-05:

     The simple tool above provides a low-tech bodge to help people locate missing friends and family in Christchurch following today's terrible earthquake.

Derived terms

• bodge job

Translations

clumsy or inelegant job — see botch

Related terms

• bodger
• botch

Etymology 2

Unknown

Noun

bodge (plural bodges)

1. (historical) The water in which a smith would quench items heated in a forge.
2. (South East England) A four-wheeled handcart used for transporting goods. Also, a homemade go-cart.

Adjective

bodge (comparative more bodge, superlative most bodge)

1. (slang, Northern Ireland) Insane, off the rails.

Anagrams

• bedog, begod