Word.ws English Dictionary

bag wig

bag wig noun: an 18th-century wig, the back-hair of which was enclosed in an ornamental bag.

bag wig: an 18th-century wig, the back-hair of which was enclosed in an ornamental bag
Image: Louis Carrogis Carmontelle, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

bag wig (plural bag wigs)

  1. (historical) An 18th-century wig, the back-hair of which was enclosed in an ornamental bag.
    • We conversed in a low tone because a full-dressed gentleman in a bag wig frequently came in and out, and when he did so, we could hear a drawling sound in the distance, which he said was one of the counsel in our case addressing the Lord Chancellor.1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853, →OCLC
    • "My advice," he said, "is this: try the case without the Judge; or, in other words, assume the legal functions of this defaulting personage in the bag-wig who is at present engaged in distending himself illegally with our Puddin'."1918, Norman Lindsay, The Magic Pudding, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 151

Forms of bag wig

pluralbag wigs

Questions about bag wig

What does bag wig mean?
Bag wig means an 18th-century wig, the back-hair of which was enclosed in an ornamental bag.
What part of speech is bag wig?
Bag wig is a noun.
What is the plural of bag wig?
The plural of bag wig is bag wigs.

Words near bag wig in the dictionary

  1. bag under one's eye
  2. bag under the eye
  3. bag up
  4. bag valve mask
  5. bag valve masks
  6. bag wig
  7. bag wigs
  8. bag-carrier
  9. bag-carriers
  10. bag-in-box
  11. bag-o'-tricks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bag wig (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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