English

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Etymology

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From hoggan (pork pasty), which see for more.

Noun

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hoggan-bag (plural hoggan-bags)

  1. (Cornwall, obsolete) A miner's bag used to carry provisions.
    • 1846, William Sandys, Specimens of Cornish Provincial Dialect:
      [page 39:] Baccy, with cowals for the chowters, Saalt pilchers, and some ' taties, Eggs, clidgy, traade, and hoganbags, Gowks, sparables, and lattice.
      [page 45:] When, who but your man com a tott'ring along, / So drunk that I thoft fath, he'd fall in the doong. A let tumble hes hoggan bag jist by the dour, So I cal'd to the man, as one woud to be shoar. Says I, "Martin, dost hire, cheel, tak up tha bag."
    • 1901, The Windsor Magazine, page 325:
      To his work he carries from the surface his keg of water, his “hoggan-bag,” and a tin, carelessly slung over his shoulder, which is full of charges []

References

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compare:
  • Edward Gepp (1923) An Essex Dialect Dictionary, page 57:
    HAGGEN-BAG, HAGNY-BAG : a pair of bags arranged to hang over the shoulders, in front and behind, for provisions, etc. Hoggen is a Cornish word for a pork pasty, or flat cake, and hoggan-bag is a miner's provison bag. From old Cornish hogen, a pork pasty, from hoch, a pig. This from E.D.D., which gives the word for Cornwall only. It is strange that it should be used with us, it is, commonly. N.E.D. seems not to notice it.