The following Tok Pisin “names” for the piano were recorded by early 20th-century writers:

• big fellow box spose whiteman fight him he cry too much (1902)
• box belong cry (“screaming box”) (1902) big fellow bokkes, suppose missis he fight him, he cry too much (1911)
• bigfela bokis yu fait-im i krai (1921)
• bikpela bokis bilong krai taim yu paitim na kikim em (1969)

Linguists observe that these circumlocutions are unstable ad hoc descriptions of an object, rather than set “words” or names. The situation is comparable to a Tok Pisin-English dictionary’s definition of a Tok Pisin word with no English equivalent, such as milis being defined as “coconut milk made from shedding coconut meat in the water of a ripe nut”; nobody would suggest that this lengthy expression is the “English name” for this drink.