kelpie

views updated May 29 2018

kelpie a water spirit of Scottish folklore, typically taking the form of a horse, reputed to delight in the drowning of travellers. The word (recorded from the late 17th century) may come from Scottish Gaelic cailpeach, colpach ‘bullock, colt’.

The later derived sense of a sheepdog of an Australian breed, originally bred from a Scottish collie, apparently comes from the name of a particular bitch, King's Kelpie (c.1879).

kelpie

views updated May 18 2018

kelpie water-sprite of the Scottish Lowlands. XVIII. of unkn. orig.