Etymology: < Dutch boedel entire property of a person, movable goods, household items, disordered collection of things, heap of rubbish, crowd, large quantity of something, affair, matter (now usually in form boel in senses related to a large quantity or collection of things; see bottle n.¹).Compare caboodle n. With the whole boodle at sense 1 compare Dutch de hele boel, (now regional) de hele boedel the whole thing, the whole lot.

Etymology: Origin uncertain. Perhaps an alteration of noodle n.¹, or perhaps a blend of booby n.¹ and noodle n.¹Perhaps compare the following quots., depreciatively characterizing members of Boodle's, a gentlemen's club founded in London in 1762, as particularly stupid or foolish:1841 C. G. F. Gore Cecil, Peer I. ix. 252 It was poor Mereworth's small talk which enlightened me to the truth of the three St. James's Street degrees of comparative dulness,—‘stupid,—damned stupid, and a Boodle.’ Now, Lord Mereworth was of Boodle's!1858 Sat. Rev. 6 Mar. 236/1 A political opponent once classed the members of a highly respectable Club under the three heads of—fools, d—d fools, and old Boodleites. N.E.D. (1887) gives the pronunciation as (bū·d'l) /ˈbuːd(ə)l/.

Etymology: < boodle n.¹ Compare earlier boodler n.