Meaning & use
bovver boots
Last updated
Meaning
nounusually pluralBritishinformalold-fashioned
Heavy lace-up boots, often with steel toecaps, associated with skinheads and rough street gangs.
Grammar: Mostly plural: a pair of bovver boots.
Patterns
- a pair of bovver boots
- in bovver boots
He stomped down the street in a pair of black bovver boots.
The band wore bovver boots and rolled-up jeans.
Her grandfather still keeps his old bovver boots in the attic.
Common combinations
- a pair of bovver boots
- He wore a pair of bovver boots to the gig.
- in bovver boots
- A gang in bovver boots walked past.
- steel-toed bovver boots
- The steel-toed bovver boots were heavy.
- lace up bovver boots
- He laced up his bovver boots.
- bovver boots and braces
- The costume included bovver boots and braces.
Synonyms and how they differ
- Doc Martens
- Doc Martens is a brand name for boots sold widely, and not always linked to aggression like bovver boots.
- combat boots
- Combat boots are military footwear, while bovver boots are tied to a youth subculture.
- work boots
- Work boots are practical footwear for jobs, with no subculture or menacing image.
Opposites
Word family
- bovver noun
- British slang spelling of bother, meaning trouble or fighting
- bovver boy noun
- a rough young man looking for trouble
- boot noun
- a sturdy shoe covering the ankle
Commonly confused: bovver boots or bother boots?
bovver boots vs bother boots
Bother boots is not a phrase; bovver is the slang spelling and only occurs in this expression.
Practice
In 1970s Britain, a young man in ____ and rolled-up jeans might be seen as a skinhead.
Choose one answer.
Bovver boots were the heavy boots linked to skinhead fashion. The others are soft or light and do not fit the image.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “bovver boots”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.