shellback
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English[edit]
Etymology[edit]
shell + back (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “...but why?”)
Noun[edit]
shellback (plural shellbacks)
- A worldly sailor.
- Synonym: barnacle
- 1918, Norman Lindsay, The Magic Pudding, page 161:
- “Take that, for being a pumpkin-headed old shellback.”
- A sailor who has crossed the equator.