hobbyhorse

hobbyhorse [hob-ee-hawrs] ExamplesWord Origin See more synonyms for hobbyhorse on Thesaurus.com noun

1. a stick with a horse’s head, or a rocking horse, ridden by children.
2. a figure of a horse, attached at the waist of a performer in a morris dance, pantomime, etc.
3. a pet idea or project.

Origin of hobbyhorse First recorded in 1550–60; hobby1 + horse Related Words for hobbyhorse hobby, cockhorse, hobbyhorse Examples from the Web for hobbyhorse Contemporary Examples of hobbyhorse

You can get “money, Nobels… celebrity for any cause or hobbyhorse….”

No One’s Going to Challenge Hillary Clinton

Robert Shrum

May 10, 2014

Obama came out for medical malpractice reform, a GOP hobbyhorse roughly forever (although the devil is in the details).

A Grownup Speech to Please Folks at Home, Not Pundits

Howard Kurtz

January 25, 2011

That you must carry everyone with you, swelling the ranks, is a hard-ridden Wasp hobbyhorse.

The Last of the Wasps

Tad Friend

September 27, 2009

Historical Examples of hobbyhorse

And when he faced that, he left the hobbyhorse where it was under the wall and went into the street.

Christmas

Zona Gale

Now for a short ride on my chief (at present) hobbyhorse, viz.

More Letters of Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin

Sheard was on his hobbyhorse, and there were few there disposed to follow him.

The Sins of Sverac Bablon

Sax Rohmer

Not one of them has any hobbyhorse, to use the phrase of Sterne.

Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3)

Thomas Babington Macaulay

Once active members of real Society; no woman could go back to “society,” any more than a roughrider could return to a hobbyhorse.

Our Androcentric Culture, or The Man Made World

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

British Dictionary definitions for hobbyhorse hobbyhorse noun

1. a toy consisting of a stick with a figure of a horse’s head at one end
2. another word for rocking horse
3. a figure of a horse attached to a performer’s waist in a pantomime, morris dance, etc
4. a favourite topic or obsessive fixed idea (esp in the phrase on one’s hobbyhorse)

verb

5. (intr) nautical (of a vessel) to pitch violently

Word Origin for hobbyhorse C16: from hobby 1, originally a small horse, hence sense 3; then generalized to apply to any pastime