Brewer's: Death's Head on a Mopstick

A thin, sickly person, a mere anatomy, is so called. When practical jokes were more common it was by no means unusual to mount on a mopstick a turnip with holes for eyes, and a candle inside, to scare travellers at night time.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
Deaths-man
Death's Head
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