billies

Noun (1)

billy (plural billies)

1. A fellow, companion, comrade, mate; partner, brother.
2. (Geordie) A good friend.
   • Fareweel, my rhyme-compoſing billie! / Your native ſoil was right ill-willie; / But may ye flouriſh like a lily, / Now bonilie! / I'll toaſt ye in my hindmoſt gillie, / Tho' owre the Sea!1786 July 31, Robert Burns, “On a Scotch Bard Gone to the West Indies”, in Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, Kilmarnock, East Ayrshire: Printed by John Wilson, →OCLC; reprinted Kilmarnock...
3. A billy goat.
   • Then, during three days, I was amazed to see nannies with kids attack and chase off large billies.1970 August, Valerius Geist, Mountain Goat Mysteries, Field & Stream, page 62
4. (UK, obsolete, slang) A silk handkerchief.
   • All fighting coves you too must know, / Ben Caunt as well as Bendigo, / And to each mill be sure to go, / […] And you must sport a blue billy, / Or a yellow wipe […]1859, Ducange Anglicus, The Vulgar Tongue, page 54

Noun (2)

billy (plural billies)

1. A highwayman's club, billy club.
2. A slubbing or roving machine.
   • […]at the time there existed in Dublin and its immediate neighbourhood, “forty-five manufacturers, having twenty-two billies, giving employment to 2885 work people, on whom depended for support 7386 individuals, manufacturing 29,312 pieces of cloth, of various qualities, valued at £336,380.”1840, The Citizen, page 347

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