Meanings
plural borogoves · alternative borogrove
- A fictional animal, described as bird-like.
It smelled like a wet borogove.
2014, Daniel Coleman, Jabberwocky: A Novel, →ISBN3 more examples
The borogove let out a quiet chirp. Another, larger borogove squirmed in through the hole in the fabric.
2006, David Brown, Kara Willey, The Worlds of Naughtenny Moore, →ISBNIts knee bent the wrong way, though Albert thought it was certainly the right way for the borogove . Another borogove popped out of the forest and followed the first across the road, then a third and a fourth .
2013, Mel Gilden, The Jabberwock Came Whiffling: A Novel of Fantasy, →ISBN, page 22With the Borogove's long legs, they hop and step over some incoming attacks.
2015, Donald Weis, Monster Lore 2, →ISBN, page 12
Origin
Coined by British author and scholar Lewis Carroll in 1855. The term was introduced in the nonsense poem Jabberwocky. Carroll's Humpty Dumpty describes a borogove as "a thin shabby-looking bird with its feathers sticking out all round, something like a live mop" and in Mischmasch, it was described as "an extinct kind of parrot. They had no wings, beaks turned up, and made their nests under sun-dials: lived on veal."
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
borogove. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/borogove
“borogove.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/borogove. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “borogove,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/borogove.
Source: borogove on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.