bustle
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Bustle
Etymology
From Middle English bustlen, bustelen, bostlen, perhaps an alteration of *busklen (> Modern English buskle), a frequentative of Middle English busken (“to prepare; make ready”), from Old Norse búask (“to prepare oneself”);[1] or alternatively from a frequentative form of Middle English busten, bisten (“to buffet; pummel; dash; beat”) + -le. Compare also Icelandic bustla (“to splash; bustle”).
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈbʌsəl/
Audio (Southern England): (file) - Rhymes: -ʌsəl
Noun
bustle (countable and uncountable, plural bustles)
- (countable, uncountable) An excited activity; a stir.
- 1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral., London: Oxford University Press, published 1973, § 34:
- we are, perhaps, all the while flattering our natural indolence, which, hating the bustle of the world, and drudgery of business seeks a pretence of reason to give itself a full and uncontrolled indulgence
- (computing, countable) A cover to protect and hide the back panel of a computer or other office machine.
- (historical, countable) A frame worn underneath a woman's skirt, typically only protruding from the rear as opposed to the earlier more circular hoops.
- 2006, Peter Godwin, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa:
- All the portraits that hang on the walls of the living room are, I realize, of my mother's family: miniatures of her great-aunts in Victorian bustles and elaborate feathered hats; a gilt-framed oil of her great-great-great-uncle as a boy in pastoral England, wearing a gold riding coat over white jodhpurs and sitting astride a white steed, a King Charles spaniel yapping at them from the foreground of the canvas.
Derived terms
Translations
excited activity
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cover to protect and hide the back panel of a computer or other office machine
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Verb
bustle (third-person singular simple present bustles, present participle bustling, simple past and past participle bustled)
- To move busily and energetically with fussiness (often followed by about).
- The commuters bustled about inside the train station.
- 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 3, member 6:
- I was once so mad to bussell abroad, and seek about for preferment […].
- To teem or abound (usually followed by with); to exhibit an energetic and active abundance (of a thing).
- The train station was bustling with commuters.
- (transitive) To push around, to importune.
- 1981, A. D. Hope, “His Coy Mistress to Mr. Marvell”, in A Book of Answers:
- Don’t bustle her or fuss or snatch: / A suitor looking at his watch / Is not a posture that persuades / Willing, much less reluctant maids.
Synonyms
Derived terms
Translations
to move busily and energetically
References
Anagrams
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