pollywog

verb

1. To collect mussels, clams, etc. in shallow water using one's hands.

   intransitive

   She was a ninety-year-old Irish lady, and knew more about the river than anyone I’d met. She knew every tow ever to pass by her house, and told me stories of pollywogging when she was a girl. When she wasn’t hunting clams, she was fishing cats, and knew every beach, island and milemarker on the river.

2. To move in the manner of a tadpole; to zigzag, undulate.

   intransitive, rare

   Crossing the goal line, [Billy "White Shoes"] Johnson was automatically transformed in to a kind of dancing cartoon: legs pollywogging back and forth like plastic limbs, knees—at least before some injuries—seemingly flexing in all planes, football held aloft in one hand.

Where it comes from

From earlier polwigge, from Middle English polwygle, equal to poll (“head”) + wiggle.

Adapted from the Wiktionary entry pollywog (CC BY-SA 4.0).

← pollmanpoltroon →

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