bauchle

English

Etymology

Scots, probably related to Old French bafouer (“to hoodwink”).

Verb

bauchle (third-person singular simple present bauchles, present participle bauchling, simple past and past participle bauchled)

1. (Scotland) To misuse, to bungle.
   • 1886, Robert Louis Stephenson, Kidnapped:

     Our enemies were disputing not far off upon the deck, and that so loudly that I could hear a word or two above the washing of the seas. “It was Shuan bauchled it,” I heard one say.

   • 1925, John Buchan, John Macnab:

     Maybe that shot that ye think ye bauchled was the most providential shot ye ever fired...

2. (Scotland) To insult, to upbraid, to make a fool of someone.
   • 1972, George MacDonald Fraser, The Steel Bonnets, page 152:

     An echo of "bauchling" lingered on, it seemed to me, in Cumbrian rural police courts until a few years ago. Nowhere else, as a court reporter, have I heard so much abusive interruption and blasphemous invocation from the public benches during the hearing of cases. Cumbrian magistrates dealt with it most tolerantly.

Noun

bauchle (plural bauchles)

1. (Scotland, chiefly in the plural) An old shoe.
   • 1842, Laird of Logan, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, issue 481, page 104.

     We a' ken that there's tongues in heads, but I ne'er heard o' ony in hats or bauchles afore.

2. (Scotland) A fool.
   • 1843, Robert Woodrow, The life of Mister Robert Bruce, Minister at Edinburgh, page 92:

     He adds, probably his letter would be propaled and made a bauchle of, and assures them he was never loved at Court as a minister.

3. (Scotland) A bungled or muddled situation; a mess.