woggin

Meaning

Noun

• A great auk (in the northern hemisphere).
• A penguin (in the southern hemisphere).

Origin

• Unknown. Found from at least 1762 through the late 1800s, at first in reference to auks. Olson and Lund speculate it initially referred to auks, followed penguin in being applied to Southern penguins, and fell out of use for auks after they went extinct, and for penguins after being displaced by penguin; they say "Beane’s (1905: 88) rendering of the cry of a penguin as “wauk” suggests a possible onomatopoeic origin", or it may be connected to woggle, a word "used in connection with the great auk" (e.g. in a 1672 work by John Josselyn; and the 1885 Journal of the American Geographical Society of New York says early writers "quaintly called [auks] 'wobble-birds'").