Definitions For Jumbuck

Noun

JUMBUCK (plural JUMBUCKs) (Australia) A sheep.

Etymology

Unknown, from pidgin, possibly from an w:australian aboriginal languages, australian aboriginal language, although it appears also to have moved from pidgin to Aboriginal. Numerous derivations have been proposed. Mr A. Meston of Brisbane, in the Sydney Bulletin of 18 April 1896, cited Aboriginal words jimba, jombock (also jombok), dombock and dumbog, all meaning "white mist preceding a shower," which a flock of sheep supposedly resembles.1966, Sidney J. Baker, The Australian Language, second edition.1968, Edward Ellis Morris, Austral English, . Charles Harpur in a handwritten footnote in his papers cites Aboriginal word junbuc or jimbuc (his handwriting is unclear), "a kind of kangaroo or wallaby", and states that the aborigines of the w:hunter valley, hunter region call the sheep thus for the hairiness of one and the wooliness of the other. Also suggested is jumbock ("to communicate").1973, Richard D. Magoffin, Fair Dinkum Matilda, — One anthropologist who compiled a vocabulary of native languages listed the word jumbuck as a verb meaning to communicate, ask or speak. This being so, then because sheep in a mob are continuously bleating and since most Australian animals are mute, it was quite feasible for them to call these talkative animals jumbucks. An English derivation is suggested in a corruption of the phrase "jump up".