leprechaun

Irish.

(lprxn, lprkn) Forms: 7 lubrican, 9 leprehaun, lepreehawn, leprechaun. [Written lupracán, lugharcán, lugracán, in O'Reilly Irish. Dict. Suppl.; in the body of the Dict. it is spelt leithbrágan, doubtless by etymologizing perversion, the sprite being ‘supposed to be always employed in making or mending a single shoe’ (leith half, bróg brogue); O'Reilly also gives luacharman as a synonym. In some mod. Irish books the spelling lioprachán occurs. All these forms may be corrupted from one original; cf. Middle Irish luchrupán (Windisch Gloss.), altered form of Old Irish luchorpán (Stokes in Revue Celtique I. 256), f. lu small + corp body.]

In Irish folk-lore, A pigmy sprite ‘who always carries a purse containing a shilling’ (O'Donovan in O'Reilly Irish Dict. Suppl. 1817).

1604 MIDDLETON 2nd Pt. Honest Wh. III. i. Wks. III. 175 As for your Irish lubrican, that spirit Whom by preposterous charms thy lust hath rais'd In a wrong circle. 1620 DEKKER Dreame (1860) 28 Mounted on a spirits back, which ran With mandrake-shrikes, and like a lubrican. 1627 DRAYTON Agincourt, etc. 127 By the Mandrakes dreadfull groanes, By the Lubricans sad moanes. 1818 LADY MORGAN Fl. Macarthy (1819) I. v. 289 There, your honor, them's my cordaries, the little Leprehauns, with their cathah heads, and their burned skins. 1860 All Year Round No. 38. 282 A little, lisping, attenuated falsetto voice, such as you would fancy would have proceeded from an Irish leprechaun. 1895 J. BARLOW Strangers at Lisconnel 231 A little ould lepreehawn.

Comb. 1883 W. BLACK Shandon Bells xvii, This little red-haired leprechaun-looking Andy.

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