bodacious

If you’re going to lie, you might as well tell a bodacious lie.

1898, Emma M. Bachus, “Tales of the Rabbit from Georgia Negroes” in Journal of American Folk-Lore (Vol 12, No 45), page 115. Google Book page link. Then that bodacious Brer Rabbit, he go softly through the bresh, and just creep inside that pig and lay hisself down, and he lay out to keep he eye open and watch out for the cart, but ’fore he know hisself he fall asleep.

Modestly titled ‘Appeal’ with a more particular subtitle, Walker’s text was probably the most bodacious expression of cultural discontent and disavowal of slavery that American society had ever known.

You, sir, are a bodacious scoundrel.

Twenty meters in diameter to match the bore of the huge Japanese ore drilling machines, the floor had been leveled by an equally bodacious milling robot, and the shiny metallic walls seemed to stretch on to infinity.