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# humbug

noun (humbug, humbugs); interjection (Humbug!)

«humbug» in the English dictionary: everyday — its meanings, how the lessons use it, and examples, each with its tree on Mova.

## Everyday

1. (UK) A hard, striped peppermint sweet, often black and white. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#m1)
2. Nonsense or a trick meant to fool people: words that sound important but are false. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#m2)
3. A person who pretends to be better, kinder or cleverer than they really are. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#m3)
4. As a cry, «Humbug!» means «Rubbish! I don't believe it!» (old-fashioned). [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#m4)

### In the lessons

Most famous from Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol, where mean old Scrooge says «Bah! Humbug!» about Christmas; so calling someone «a bit of a Scrooge» or saying «bah humbug» today means grumbling about fun. In the UK, humbugs are old-fashioned sweets sold in jars. In stories a humbug is a fraud or a show-off who is found out. Phrases: «bah, humbug», «a mint humbug».

### Examples

- Grandad bought a paper bag of mint humbugs at the sweet shop. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x1)
- «Bah! Humbug!» growled Scrooge when his nephew wished him a merry Christmas. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x2)
- The magic cure the man sold at the fair was pure humbug. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x3)
- Don't be such a humbug about the party, Dad! [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x4)
- The humbug stuck to my teeth for ages. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x5)
- He pretended to be a great explorer, but he was a humbug who had never left town. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x6)
- My brother says «bah humbug» every time we put up the Christmas tree. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x7)
- “Doesn’t anyone else know you’re a humbug?” asked Dorothy. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/#x8)

### Note

The sweet is countable (a humbug, humbugs); the nonsense sense is mostly uncountable («that's humbug»). The sweet is mostly British; in the USA the word is known mainly from Scrooge.

## On Mova

- [Trees and pragmatics of «humbug» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/H/humbug/): every meaning and example parsed by Mova, with its dependency tree and frames.
- [«humbug» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/dictionaries/school/w/humbug.html) on Mova free.