Brewer's: Widenostrils

(3 syl.). (French, Bringuenarilles.) A huge giant, who subsisted on windmills, and lived in the island of Tohu. When Pantagruel and his fleet reached this island no food could be cooked because Widenostrils had swallowed “every individual pan, skillet, kettle, frying-pan, dripping-pan, boiler, and saucepan in the land,” and died from eating a lump of butter. Tohu and Bohu, two contiguous islands (in Hebrew, toil and confusion), mean lands laid waste by war. The giant had eaten everything, so that there was “nothing to fry with,” as the French say —i.e. nothing left to live upon.

Related Content Allusions Foreign Words and Phrases Latin and Greek Word Elements Names: Their Origins and Meanings Old Testament Names Mythology Ancient Greek Literature & Mythology The Bible (King James version) The Koran (translation by J. M. Rodwell) Shakespeare's Plays Tales from Shakespeare (Charles and Mary Lamb) Frequently Misspelled Words Frequently Mispronounced Words Easily Confused Words Writing & Language