jackleg means amateur, untrained; incompetent. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 87 out of 100.
Etymology
From jack + leg. Compare blackleg (“a person who replaces striking workers; a cheater”) and such expressions as jack of all trades, every man jack.
adj
- Amateur, untrained; incompetent.“1841, Letter to the editor, The Southern Planter, Volume I, No. 1, January 1841, p. 12,
The next year I had a projecting kind of jack leg carpenter, from Hanover, living with me in the capacity of overseer […]”
- Dishonest, unscrupulous.“The little nosy reporter with the hair was fair crazy to come, but McGinty gets a jackleg doctor to examine him an’ swear that he’s sufferin’ from spatulation o’ the medulla oblongata, housemaid’s knee, and the hives.”
- Ineptly built or operated; makeshift.“The train is late […]. ¶ “Well, if I come to such a place as this I must expect a jackleg railroad […].””
noun
- A type of drill operated by means of compressed air.
- An amateur; an untrained or incompetent person.“[…] I, gentlemen and ladies, are a rale Scientificky! I ain’t none of your jack-legs.”
- A shyster or con artist; a gambler who cheats; a generally dishonest or reprehensible person.““[…] we ain’t called on to believe every smooth-talking jackleg who wanders in here.””