Dictionary

link boy en · NOUN

Etymology

From link (“torch, light”) + boy.

Meanings

1. (historical) A boy employed to carry a torch or other light at night to help people navigate through the streets.
   • By the early eighteenth century link-boys had long been part of London's criminal and sexual mythology. 2009, Dan Cruikshank, The Secret History of Georgian London, Random House, page 94:
   • “Servants is in the arms o' Porpus, I think,” said the short chairman, warming his hands at the attendant link-boy’s torch. 1836 March – 1837 October, Charles Dickens, “(please specify the chapter name)”, in The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1837, →OCLC:

Forms

Synonyms

linkman · torchbearer