buckeen

English

Etymology

From Irish boicín, the diminutive of boc. Equivalent to buck +‎ -een.

Noun

buckeen (plural buckeens)

  1. (Ireland, historical) a poor young man of the lower Anglo-Irish gentry who aspires to the habits and dress of the wealthy. [from 18th c.]
    • 1917, William Francis Thomas Butler, Confiscation in Irish history, page 248:
      Probably no other country could produce such a degraded type as the squireen or buckeen, the drunken, gambling, profligate descendant of the Cromwellian or Williamite settler.
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