Clod-hopper

There’s not a great deal to be said about this term. The derivation isn’t known, although it could be as a comic allusion to grasshopper. Clods are lumps of earth, of course, and the word derives as a variant of ‘clot’ – a coagulation.

The term clod-hopper is first cited in the definition in ‘A New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting Crew‘, 1690:

“Clod-hopper, a Ploughman.”

It was usually used, as a term of derision, by townspeople at the expense of muddy booted yokels – much in the way the ‘bog-trotter’ is now used to defame the rural Irish.

Since the early 19th century, in the UK and USA, ‘clod-hoppers’ were also the name given to ploughmen’s boots.