bosk

noun
/bɒsk/UK/bɑsk/US

Etymology

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”), 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)”), Sicilian voscu (“wood”), 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”).

  1. derived from *bʰuH- — “to become, grow, appear
  2. derived from *buskaz — “bush, thicket
  3. derived from *busk
  4. derived from busca
  5. derived from bosca — “firewood
  6. inherited from *busc
  7. inherited from bosk

Definitions

  1. A bush.

  2. A thicket

    A thicket; a small wood.

    • Meantime, through well-known bosk and dell, / I'll lead where we may shelter well.
    • [...] 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.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for bosk. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA