bonxie

English

Etymology

From Scots bonxie, from Old Norse bunki.

Noun

bonxie (plural bonxies)

1. (UK, chiefly Shetland) The great skua, Stercorarius skua.
   • 2006, Graham Uney, Backpacker's Britain: Northern Scotland:

     Bonxies are more than happy to fly at you as you walk harmlessly across the moors, and they regularly clip people with a wing or extended foot […]

   • 2020, Tim Ecott, The Land of Maybe, Short Books, published 2021, page 102:

     It is the large brown bonxies that heckle me as I pass across the high moor and approach the sheep gate.

References

• “bonxie” in the Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries.

Scots

Etymology

From Old Norse bunki.

Noun

bonxie (plural bonxies)

1. (chiefly Shetland) the great skua, Stercorarius skua

   Synonym: skooi

References

• “bonxie” in the Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries.