hellion

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. An unruly, rowdy or mischievous person, especially a child.
  2. An evil person.
  3. The larva of the dobsonfly.
adj
  1. Cursed, ill-fated.

Pronunciation

/ˈhɛliən/

Word forms

hellion hellions

Etymology

An alteration, under the influence of hell, of northern English/Scottish dialectal hallion (“scamp, worthless fellow”), of unknown origin.

Related words

This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.