(hŏbˈnŏbˌ)
intransitive verb hob·nobbed,
hob·nob·bing,
hob·nobs To associate familiarly: hobnobs with the executives.
Word History: Hobnobbing with our social betters can be a hit-or-miss proposition, a fact that has an etymological justification. The verb
hobnob originally meant “to drink together” and occurred as a varying phrase,
hob or nob, hob-a-nob, or
hob and nob, the first of which is recorded in 1763. This phrasal form reflects the origins of the verb in similar phrases that were used when two people toasted each other. The phrases were probably so used because
hob is a variant of
hab and
nob of
nab, which are probably forms of
have and its negative. In Middle English, for example, one finds the forms
habbe, “to have,” and
nabbe, “not to have.”
Hab or nab, or simply
hab nab, thus meant “get or lose, hit or miss,” and the variant
hob-nob also meant “hit or miss.” Used in the drinking phrase,
hob or nob probably meant “give or take”; from a drinking situation
hob nob spread to other forms of chumminess.
