hobbyhorse
noun
Did you know?
Does your favorite hobby involve a horse? Whether it does or not, the word hobby is undeniably equine: it’s a shortening of the older term hobbyhorse. And in a strange etymological twist, the word hobbyhorse is itself a product of an older word hobby that in the 1400s referred to a small or medium-sized horse, especially one that moved at a gentle pace. By the mid 1500s, hobby horse was being used to refer to a horse costume worn by a person participating in a morris dance or other performance, and then to a toy consisting of a stick with a toy horse's head at one end that a child pretends to ride. By the next century the literal horse was unneeded, and hobbyhorse could refer to a favorite pursuit or pastime—that is, our modern hobby. From pastime, the meaning of hobbyhorse was extended to “a subject that someone returns to repeatedly, especially in conversation.” This sense is typically encountered in such phrases as “get on one’s hobbyhorse” or “ride one’s hobbyhorse.”
Examples of hobbyhorse in a Sentence
James Parker, The Atlantic, 28 Jan. 2025
Never mind the crime issue or that favorite Trumpian hobbyhorse, immigration and the border.
—Mark Z. Barabak, Los Angeles Times, 14 Aug. 2024
Riding clubs and hobbyhorse camps foster those close connections.
—Miles Klee, Rolling Stone, 13 June 2024
In part that’s because, to climb back on an old hobbyhorse of mine, platforms are still too stingy with the data that might help researchers understand them better.
—Casey Newton, The Verge, 24 May 2023
Nor does the Trooper seem to hobbyhorse longitudinally or wobble laterally while running straight on some surfaces, as the S-10 Blazer sometimes does.
—Pete Lyons, Car and Driver, 26 Mar. 2023
The short-wheelbase Suzuki hobbyhorses over these rhythmic disturbances and sets your guts a-bouncing.
—Kevin Smith, Car and Driver, 4 Mar. 2023
This is a hobbyhorse of Washington progressives, both because federal jurisdiction over gun crimes hinges on their movement in interstate commerce, and because bloviating about guns is more palatable than addressing who exactly is using guns illegally, a third rail in Democratic Party politics.
—Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, 5 Feb. 2022
Most of the criticism is baseless tripe hatched to advance Trump or some other Fox News hobbyhorse, though there have been plenty of legitimate reasons to bash MSNBC and CNN over the years.
—Erik Wemple, Washington Post, 19 July 2022
Cite this Entry
“Hobbyhorse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hobbyhorse. Accessed 19 Mar. 2025.
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hobbyhorse
noun
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