bosk
English
Etymology
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/15/Thicket_%2821366948685%29.jpg/220px-Thicket_%2821366948685%29.jpg)
From Middle English bosk, busk, variants of bush (“grove, wood; thicket, underbrush; bush; branch of a shrub or tree”), from Old English busc (attested only in place names), likely from Anglo-Latin bosca (“firewood”), from Late Latin busca, buscus, boscus (“wood; woodland”),[1] from Frankish and Proto-West Germanic *busk, from Proto-Germanic *buskaz (“bush, thicket”), probably from Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH- (“to become, grow, appear”).
The English word is cognate with Dalmatian buasc (“forest; wood”), French bois (“wood (material); wood, woodland”), Italian bosco (“wood (wooded area)”), Middle Dutch bosch, busch (modern Dutch bos (“forest; wood”)), Norwegian busk (“bush, shrub”); Occitan boscs, Old High German busk (“bush”) (Middle High German busch, bosch, modern German Busch (“bush, shrub; brush, scrub”)), Portuguese bosque (“grove”), Spanish bosque (“forest”), West Frisian bosk (“forest”). Doublet of bush.
Alternatively, the modern word may be a back-formation from bosky (“having abundant bushes, shrubs, or trees”).[2]
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /bɒsk/
Audio (Received Pronunciation): (file) - (General American) IPA(key): /bɑsk/
- Rhymes: -ɒsk, -ɑsk
Noun
bosk (plural bosks)
- (obsolete except dialectal) A bush.
- (archaic) A thicket; a small wood.
- 1815, Walter Scott, “Canto Fifth”, in The Lord of the Isles, a Poem, Edinburgh: […] [F]or Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown; by James Ballantyne and Co., […], →OCLC, stanza XVI, page 196:
- Meantime, through well-known bosk and dell, / I'll lead where we may shelter well.
- 1847, Alfred Tennyson, “Part I”, in The Princess: A Medley, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 17:
- [...] and so by town and thorpe, / And tilth, and blowing bosks of wilderness, / We gain'd the mother-city thick with towers, / And in the imperial palace found the king.
- 1857, Pisistratus Caxton [pseudonym; Edward Bulwer-Lytton], chapter I, in What will He Do with It? (Collection of British Authors; CCCCVII), Tauchnitz edition, volume I, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, →OCLC, book II, page 140:
- The enclosure was indeed little beyond that of a good-sized paddock – its boundaries were visible on every side – but swelling uplands, covered with massy foliage sloped down to its wild irregular turf soil – soil poor for pasturage, but pleasant to the eye; with dell and dingle, bosks of fantastic pollards – dotted oaks of vast growth – here and there a weird hollow thorn-tree – patches of fern and gorse.
- 1862 May 4, Henry H[opkins] Sibley, “Operations in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. February 1 – September 20, 1862. [No. 8. Reports of Brig. Gen. Henry H. Sibley, C.S. Army, Commanding Army of New Mexico, Including Operations from January – to May 4, 1862.]”, in A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Additions and Corrections to Series I—Volume IX, Washington, D.C.: Published under the direction of the Hon. Elihu Root, Secretary of War, by Brig. Gen. Fred C[rayton] Ainsworth, Chief of the Record and Pension Office, War Department, and Mr. Joseph W. Kirkley; Government Printing Office, published 1902, →OCLC, page 507:
- On February 16 a reconnaissance in force was pushed to within a mile of the fort and battle offered on the open plain. The challenge was disregarded, and only noticed by the sending out of a few well-mounted men to watch our movements. The forces of the enemy were kept well concealed in the bosque (grove) above the fort and within its walls.
- 1991, Contract Design, volume 33, New York, N.Y.: Gralla Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 87, column 12:
- Gensler also used box-trimmed ficus bosks in the executive dining area, where privacy is more important. "We made the spacing more generous between tables, grouped the tables in threes and fours, and set each group off with the bosks," [...]
- 1991, David C. Streatfield, “The Olmsteads and the Landscape of the Mall”, in Richard Longstreth, editor, The Mall in Washington, 1791–1991: Symposium: Papers (Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts: Symposium Papers; 14), Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, →ISBN, page 138, column 2:
- The area on the north side of the Mall that had been occupied for several decades by temporary structures was redesigned with a varied series of formal bosks evoking the character of baroque woodlands.
Alternative forms
- bosque (rare)
Derived terms
Related terms
Translations
See also
References
- ^ “bush, n.(1)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 16 March 2019.
- ^ “bosk, n.”, in OED Online
, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1887; “bosk, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
Anagrams
Albanian
Noun
bosk m
Synonyms
Maltese
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
bosk m (plural boskijiet)
Related terms
West Frisian
Etymology
From Old Frisian bosk, from Proto-West Germanic *busk, from Proto-Germanic *buskaz.
Noun
bosk n (plural bosken, diminutive boskje)
Derived terms
Further reading
- “bosk”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011
Noun
bosk c (plural bosken, diminutive boskje)
Further reading
- “bosk”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011
- English terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *bʰuH-
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms inherited from Old English
- English terms derived from Old English
- English terms derived from Latin
- English terms derived from Late Latin
- English terms derived from Frankish
- English terms derived from Proto-West Germanic
- English terms derived from Proto-Germanic
- English doublets
- English back-formations
- English 1-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio links
- Rhymes:English/ɒsk
- Rhymes:English/ɒsk/1 syllable
- Rhymes:English/ɑsk
- Rhymes:English/ɑsk/1 syllable
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with obsolete senses
- English dialectal terms
- English terms with archaic senses
- English terms with quotations
- en:Forests
- en:Shrubs
- Albanian lemmas
- Albanian nouns
- Albanian masculine nouns
- Maltese terms borrowed from Italian
- Maltese terms derived from Italian
- Maltese 1-syllable words
- Maltese terms with IPA pronunciation
- Maltese lemmas
- Maltese nouns
- Maltese masculine nouns
- West Frisian terms inherited from Old Frisian
- West Frisian terms derived from Old Frisian
- West Frisian terms inherited from Proto-West Germanic
- West Frisian terms derived from Proto-West Germanic
- West Frisian terms inherited from Proto-Germanic
- West Frisian terms derived from Proto-Germanic
- West Frisian lemmas
- West Frisian nouns
- West Frisian neuter nouns
- West Frisian common-gender nouns