Green’s Dictionary of Slang

bell-wether n.

1. the leader of a mob.

1430		Lydgate Bochas 224a: I was cleped in my countrey The belweather [F&H].
1577		Holinshed Chronicles (Ireland) II 40/2: Thomas being the ringleader of the one sect, and Scotus the belweadder of the other.
1594		Greene Frier Bacon and Frier Bungay D3: I am [...] the Belwether of this company, these are my lords, and I the prince of Wales.
1620		J. Taylor Taylor his trauels n.p.: He search'd his pockets (I'le not say he pick'd) / And finding (as he sayd) no mony there, / To heare how then the bellwether did sweare.
1641		Certain briefe treatises written by diverse learned men 155: Bellarmine your great Bellwether [...] is now in his old age returned to his former opinion.
1651		R. Watson Akolouthos 91: [T]hough too great a number in the Christian flocke follow such as you for their bellwether or leading ramme, they will flie as fast from you when they espie you in your proper shape to be a wolfe.
1687		T. Brown Saints in Uproar in Works (1760) I 73: Who are the principal bell-weathers of this mutiny?
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: belweather chief or Leader of the Flock. Master of misrule, also a clamorous noisy Man.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: bell wether the chief or leader of a mob. Idea taken from a flock of sheep, where the wether has a bell about his neck.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1817		Southey Wat Tyler II i: Come, you old stirrer-up of insurrection, You bell-wether of the mob.
1848		J.R. Lowell Biglow Papers (1880) 5: ’Tain’t afollerin’ your bell-wethers will excuse ye in His sight.
1850		Belfast Protestant Jrnl 27 July 1/2: Before [...] the clergy of the Metropolis [...] follow the bell-wether of St Martin’s Hall into the pit.
1888		Shefield Eve. Teleg. 16 Nov. 2/2: The lackadaisical young ruffian [...] has also played bell-wether to some of his evilly disposed countrymen.
1908		Western Times 7 Feb. 11/3: A number of Women Suffragists behaved in a disordley manner [...] Miss Bourchier protested, whereupon Mr Plowden remarked, ‘You appear to be the bell-weather of the flock’.

2. a very noisy man.

c.1460		Towneley Mysteries ‘Prima Pastorum’ (3) line 112: Go now, bell-weder!
c.1597		Shakespeare Merry Wives of Windsor III v: I suffered [...] an intolerable fright, to be detected with a jealous rotten bell-wether.
1606		Return from Parnassus Pt II I ii: What, a bel-wether in Paules Church-yard? So cald because it keeps a bleating.
1612		J. Taylor Laugh and Be Fat 32: Ram-headed Bel-weathers shall ring thy fame.
1620		Shelton Quixote IV xiii 109: She made me weep, that am no bell-weather [F&H].
1737		Pope Mother Gin 15: Herds of city Saints elected, As Bell-weathers and Bulls, for noise respected [...] who from their tubs Make bulls in praise of Schism and Calves-head clubs.
1762		Bridges Homer Travestie (1764) II 47: The Greek and Trojan hosts together / Couldn’t make such noise as this bell-wether / Roaring.
1867		G.W. Harris Sut Lovingood’s Yarns 267: The blusterin ole bell wether jis’ wilted down’ an’ sot in tu strippin slow, an’ a-beggin, an’ a-promisin, an’ a-makin money offers.
1869		Sthn Reporter & Cork Courier 17 June 2/5: A great sacrilegious ‘bell-wether’ was welcomed by the crowd as a ‘corker’.

In derivatives

bell-wetherishness (n.)

clamour, noisiness.

1882

Spectator 387: The gregariousness and bell-wetherishness of the English people who must all do the same thing at once [F&H].