beast with two backs

First attested in English by William Shakespeare, see quotations. Supposedly a calque of French la beste à deux doz (in modern French, la bête à deux dos) from Gargantua and Pantagruel, 1534, by François Rabelais.

• "I am one ſir, that come to tell you, your daughter, and the Moore, are now making the Beaſt with two backs."
• "[H]e remained one of the few boys of his year with whom Adrian had never made the beast with two backs, or rather with whom he had never made the beast with one back and an interestingly shaped middle, […]"

• double-backed beast
• two-backed beast