Green’s Dictionary of Slang

bubble n.1

[the schemes so proposed are as insubstantial, if as superficially shiny, as a soap bubble; the (linguistic) archetype is the South Sea Bubble of 1721]

1. a victim, one who is ripe for being fooled.

[UK]Look About You I i: Thou worm of majesty, thou froth, thou bubble!
[UK]J. Cook Greenes Tu Quoque Scene xvi: Sonne Bubble, where did you two buy your Felts?
[UK]Fletcher Island Princess I iii: Am I in competition with such bubbles?
[UK]Mercurius Fumigosus 18 27 Sept.–4 Oct. 155: Avant ye empty-pated Bubbles, that with mole-eyes at me do look asquint.
[UK]T. Shadwell Epsom Wells III i: What admirable Cuckolds and Bubbles have we met with.
[UK]T. Shadwell Squire of Alsatia III i: Should I always be kept a country bubble, caravan, a mere put?
[UK]G. Granville She-Gallants I i: [O]ne is call'd Vaunter, and the other Sir Iohn Airy, Fops, with great Estates; Cullies to the Women, and Bubbles to the Men.
[UK]Answer to the Fifteen Comforts of Whoring 3: For as I was by fickle Man betray’d, / So Men by me too shall be Bubbles made.
[UK]N. Ward Vulgus Britannicus I 8: So he that does a fraud intend / First treats the Bubble like Friend.
[UK] in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy III 94: Not one who to noose, / Some young Bubble bestows, / Her whole slender Fortune / In Trifles and Cloaths.
[UK]Penkethman’s Jests 101: Why, says he, Betty, you can’t want, you had a good Bubble last Night.
[UK]Hist. of Col. Francis Charteris 24: Honest Frank, being at a Hazard Table, and having a Dispute with a Gentleman [...] who had already been a very great Bubble to him, and who he hop’d would prove yet better.
[UK]Fielding Tom Jones (1959) 13: This would be to own herself the mere tool and bubble of a man.
[Ire]C. Macklin Love à la Mode II i: He is taking him in—the bubble’s bit.
[UK]O. Goldsmith Life of Richard Nash in Coll. Works (1966) III 347: The two pickers up, or Money-Droppers, [...] bring in Flats or Bubbles.
[UK]R. King Frauds of London 28: The shame of being thought a bubble, [...] frequently prevents gentlemen from making use of the statute provided.
Garrick Country Girl II i: Wrong him! [...] he’s beneath an injury; a bubble, a coward, a senseless idiot.
[UK]G.A. Stevens Adventures of a Speculist II 182: These foreigners could pick every stiver out of a Bubble’s pocket with such extreme politeness.
[UK]Sporting Mag. Oct. III 52/2: Each strives to be foremost, and get the first in, / For he’s just a bubble who don’t wish to win.
[UK] ‘Modern Dict.’ in Sporting Mag. May XVIII 100/2: Game. – Bubbles, or Pigeons, drawn to be cheated.
[UK]G. Barrington New London Spy 24: The shame of being thought a bubble, and exposed to the town, frequently prevents gentlemen from making use of the statutes provided in such cases.
[UK]Lex. Balatronicum n.p.: The bubble, the party cheated; perhaps from his being like an air bubble, filled with words, which are only wind, instead of real property.
[UK]E.V. Kenealy Goethe: a New Pantomime in Poetical Works 2 (1878) 334: Bubble, Addlepate, Snip, Bumpkin, / Dog-heart, is it thus you bark?

2. a sham or otherwise dubious company; thus any dubious scheme.

[UK]W. Taverner Maid the Mistress V i: Honour is a meer Bubble, made use of by all the World.
[UK] in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy III 122: Belzebub Scratch’d, and was in great trouble, / For he thought it would prove a two Hours Bubble.
[UK]Cibber Refusal 13: Hey-day! What is Marriage a Bubble too?
[UK]Fielding Lottery 28: Damn you, Fool, Idiot. – Blood! Blunders! Blanks! Bubbles!
[UK]B. Martin Eng. Dict. (2nd edn).
[WI]T. Chatterton Revenge I ii: What is love? an air-blown bubble, / Only silly fools receive it.
[UK]Foote Bankrupt in Works (1799) II 116: The people of this country are always ready to bite at a bubble.
[Ind]Hicky’s Bengal Gaz. 15-22 Dec. n.p.: The Isle of Skey plate which provided such keen sport is likely to prove a Bubble at last.
[UK] ‘Bubble public companies’ in Holloway & Black (1979) II 256: Blow bubbles blow they’re rising fast / There’s room for many more.
[UK]Satirist (London) 25 Nov. 382/3: The electors would do well to take care, and not allow him [i.e. a political candidate] to soap them [...] It is natural that a soapboiler should be an advocate for bubbles.
[Aus]Bell’s Life in Sydney 21 Mar. 2/5: I hates Bounce, for Bounce is got by Bubble Scheme out of Cross Match, and runs at murder, robber, and all manners of crime !
[UK]Paul Pry 19 Mar. 1/2: [W]e have ever had a most solid contempt for, and suspicion of anything approximating to bubbles.
[UK]Duncombe New and Improved Flash Dict.
[Ind]Delhi Sketch Bk 1 Jan. 4/1: Unmask a quack? or trace the ways / Of bubble Projector’s awful maze?
[UK](con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor III 228/2: Just after the railway bubble; nobody wanted anything at all then.
[US]J. O’Connor Wanderings of a Vagabond 56: We find in Washington Irving’s tale of the great Mississippi bubble, a description of John Law, a Scotchman, who was the prime mover in that celebrated swindle.
[Aus]Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 12: Bubble Company, land and ruining syndicates; a swindling association.
[UK]R.H. Savage Brought to Bay 179: He’s a cad – and a bubble promoter!
[US]F. Packard White Moll 213: ‘I’m getting sick of bubbles!’ she announced insolently. ‘What’s this one?’.

3. attrib. use of sense 2, fraudulent.

[UK]Garrick Male-Coquette II ii: There shall be none, lesse it wou’d be a bubble Bet.
[UK] ‘Jack in Capel Court’ in G.D. Atkin House Scraps (1887) 108: Then the director, Full of strange schemes [...] and sudden growing rich, / Getting a bubble reputation.
[UK]C.R. Read What I Heard, Saw, and Did 224: I trust they will not patronize any bubble schemes [...] but support bona fide ones.
[UK]J.A. Hardwick ‘The Daily News’ Prince of Wales’ Own Song Book 46: Bubble companies spring up [...] While Jeremy Diddlers do it brown.
[US]C.H. Spurgeon John Ploughman’s Talk 67: Bubbles are fine fun for boys, but bubble companies are edged tools that none should play with.
[UK]H. Smart Social Sinners II 99: My inheritance disappears as if it had been invested in a bubble company.
[UK] in G.D. Atkin House Scraps 115: At about the time the bubble schemes were flourishing, in 1825, Mr. Abernethy met some friends who had risked a large sum of money in one of those fraudulent speculations.
[Aus]Drew & Evans Grafter (1922) 99: The ‘game’ was a bubble with Skinny.

4. see bubble-gum machine n. (1)

In compounds

bubble-man (n.)

one who promotes fraudulent companies.

[UK]H. Mayhew Great World of London I 46: Bubble men, who institute sham annuity offices or assurance companies.
[UK]H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor IV 25: Bubble-Men, defrauding by instituting pretended companies — as Sham Next-of-Kin-Societies, Assurance and Annuity Offices, Benefit Clubs, and the like.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

bubblebutt (n.) (also bubbleass) [butt n.1 (1a)] (US campus)

1. large, protruding, rounded buttocks; thus bubble-assed adj.

[US]J. Wambaugh Blue Knight 240: My partner [...] was laying up in a hotel room knocking a chunk off some bubble-assed taxi dancer.
[US]P. Munro Sl. U.
[US]T. Jones Pugilist at Rest 146: Window had a bubble butt and short feet.
[US]‘Single Daddy’ ‘Kristen’ 🌐 I found that her sweet little bubble butt was ticklish, and she didn’t seem to have any problem with me occasionally groping her breasts and ass as we played and tickled.
S. Stukin in Vibe (Boulder, CO) Mar. 143/1: ‘Hispanics want a bubble butt like J.Lo.’.

2. the person who has such a physique.

[US]P. Munro Sl. U.
[US]K. Kainulainen ‘University Euphemisms in Calif. Today’ 🌐 There is a great number of euphemistic expressions for someone stupid or someone who is not like everyone else [...] ‘bubblebutt’ (a large rear end) and ‘pizza-face’ (a person with severe acne).
bubble dancing (n.) [SE soap bubbles + pun on SE bubble-dancer, a woman who dances, wearing nothing but strategically placed balloons]

(US) washing up; thus bubble dancer n., a washer-up.

[US] ‘Army Sl.’ in AS XVI:3 164: Bubble Dancing, Dishwashing.
[US]H.B. Hersey G.I. Laughs 171: Bubble dancer, dishwasher.
[US]M.H. Boulware Jive and Sl.
bubblegum/gummer (n.)

see see separate entries.

bubblehead/headed

see see separate entries.

bubble-top (n.) (also bubbletop)

1. (US, also bubble) a police car [the flashing lights on its roof].

[US] in DARE.

2. an electric sun roof in a car; also attrib.

[US]R. Woodley Dealer 142: He nodded at an Eldorado stopped for a light. ‘See that car? That bubbletop? White tires? Fuckin nigger Cadillac’.
[UK](con. 1971) W. Sherman Times Square 57: It was him and Fast Buck drove in together. They both had these bubble-top Caddies and seven girls each.

3. (US campus) a woman with a bouffant hairdo.

[US]Current Sl. I:4.