Also 7, 9 Sc. fab, 8 fobb. [of unknown origin; cf. HG. dial. fuppe pocket, fuppen, einfuppen to pocket stealthily; a Ger. word fupsack is cited by Skinner.
If the word meant originally a secret pocket, it may be connected with FOB v.1]
1. A small pocket formerly made in the waistband of the breeches and used for carrying a watch, money, or other valuables.
1653. Brome, Crt. Beggar, II. i. Wks. 1873, I. i. 212. My Fob has been fubd to day of six pieces, and a dozen shillings at least.
1667. St. Papers, Dom., CXCI. No. 63. II. The right side pockett … and the small pockett or fobb.
1711. Addison, Spect., No. 77, 29 May, ¶ 1. To my great Surprize, I saw him squirr away his Watch a considerable way into the Thames, and with great Sedateness in his Looks put up the Pebble, he had before found, in his Fob.
1751. Smollett, Per. Pic. (1779), III. lxxxiii. 294. Whilst the careful mother thus exercised her talent for reprehension, the hopeful young gentleman, with an hand in each fob, stood whistling an opera tune, without seeming to pay the most profound regard to his parent’s reproof.
1819. T. Moore Tom Crib’s Mem., 1.
| Whatsoever employs your magnificent nobs, | |
| Whether diddling your subjects, and gutting their fobs. |
1838. Dickens, Nich. Nick., iii. Mr. Nickleby replaced his watch in his fob, and, fitting on his gloves to a nicety, turned upon his way, and walked slowly westward with his hands behind him.
b. nonce-use. The contents of the fob, ‘cash.’
c. 1680[?]. Royal Resolutions, in Marvell’s Wks. (Grosart), I. 431.
| When plate was at pawn, and fob at an ebb, | |
| And spider might weave in bowels its web. |
2. U.S. = fob-chain.
1889. E. Ripley, From Flag to Flag, xxiv. 211. Before he could advance a step, one of the men wheeled his horse across the narrow pathway in front of him and, pointing menacingly at the tempting fob that hung from his pocket, repeated the demand (as now appeared) in a low and threatening tone.
1893. Farmer, Slang, Fob … a watch-chain or ribbon, with buckle and seals, worn hanging from the fob.
3. A trimming resembling a fob-chain.
1894. Daily News, 22 June, 6/6. Skirt trimmed on the hips with fobs of bright rose-pink velvet, two on either side.
4. attrib., as fob-pocket, -watch; fob-chain, the chain attached to a watch carried in the fob.
1885. H. C. McCook, Tenants of an Old Farm, 121. In these latter days his waistcoat has expanded somewhat above a growing rotundity, and beneath it a goodly *fobchain protrudes.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xxviii. With a wery handsome gold watch-chain hangin’ out, about a foot and a half, and a gold watch in his *fob pocket.
1884. S. Dowell, Tax. in Eng., III. III. iii. § 11 (1888), 273. Fob watches were not indeed unknown, for a *fob watch is in existence that belonged to Oliver Cromwell; but this way of wearing them did not become general until a later date.
