English edit

Etymology edit

From bell +‎ box.

Noun edit

bellbox (plural bellboxes)

  1. A strong metal box that contains the ringing apparatus of an alarm.
  2. (mining, historical) A bell-shaped apparatus used to extract broken rods from the bottom of a mine shaft.
    • 1929, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, When the World Screamed[1]:
      My foreman with his faked assistant had littered the place with all my apparatus, my bellbox, my crowsfoot, the V-drills, the rods, and the weight, but Malone insisted that we disregard all that and descend ourselves to the lowest level.