bustle en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- /ˈbʌsəl/
- (Southern-England) audio
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”); or alternatively from a frequentative form of Middle English busten, bisten (“to buffet; pummel; dash; beat”) + -le. Compare also Icelandic bustla (“to splash; bustle”). The etymology of noun sense 3 is uncertain, perhaps related to busk (“strip in a corset”) or German Buschel.
Meanings
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(countable, uncountable) An excited activity; a stir.
My father was in the meantime overjoyed and in the bustle of preparation only recognized in the melancholy of his niece the diffidence of a bride.
1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC:the hum and bustle; a din and bustle
[…]we are, perhaps, all the while flattering our natural Indolence, which, hating the Buſtle of the World and Drudgery of Buſineſs, ſeeks a Pretext of Reaſon, to give itſelf a full and uncontroul'd Indulgence.
1748, [David Hume], “Essay V. Sceptical Solution of These Doubts.”, in Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, part I, page 70:Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course — and in truth it was something very like it in that house.
1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “Stave Three. The Second of the Three Spirits.”, in A Christmas Carol. […], London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, page 92:In the midſt of all this buſtle, I was ſtruck with the appearance of a large bevy of beauties and women of the firſt fashion, who with all the perfect confidence of good breeding, inſhrined themſelves in the ſeveral temples dedicated to the Cyprian Venus[.]
1755, Adam Fitz-Adam, The World, number CXXI, London, page 789:The house has been in great bustle all the morning with people coming and going.
1849, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], “(please specify the page)”, in Shirley. A Tale. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], →OCLC:As the self-confessed scourge of “doomsters and gloomsters”, the prime minister visibly loathed having to tell the nation in March their local would be shut down by the government – and enjoyed telling them “bustle” can now return to the high street.
2020 June 26, Heather Stewart, “Boris Johnson hopes bullish approach can bring back the 'bustle'”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:the whirl and bustle of a large metropolis
As the sun ascends to his meridian, the hum and bustle gradually decline; at the height of noon there is a pause.
1832, [Washington Irving], The Alhambra: A Series of Tales and Sketches of the Moors and Spaniards. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), Philadelphia, Pa.: [Henry Charles] Carey & [Isaac] Lea, →OCLC:
- (countable) A cover to protect and hide the back panel of a computer or other office machine.
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(countable, historical) A frame worn underneath a woman's skirt, typically only protruding from the rear as opposed to the earlier more circular hoops.
A grotesque-looking lady wearing a bustle (Anna mentally undressed the woman, and was appalled at her hideousness), and a little girl laughing affectedly ran down the platform.
1901 [1878], chapter 31, in Constance Garnett, transl., Anna Karenina, translation of Анна Каренина (Anna Karenina) by Leo Tolstoy, part 7: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.
2006, Peter Godwin, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa:
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(UK, obsolete, slang, uncountable) Money; cash.
Why the old clerical's turned coper—a new way of raising the wind——letting his friends down easy—gave you a good dinner, I suppose, Sir John, and took this method of drawing the bustle for it: an old trick of the reverend's.
1825, Charles Molloy Westmacott, The English Spy, page 236:
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| bustles | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Deriveds
bustly · hustle and bustle · hustle-bustle · bustlesome
Synonyms
Translations (42)
fi säpinä (excited activity) · ca bullícia (excited activity) · fi kihinä (excited activity) · ota قیزغینلق (excited activity) · ary روينة (excited activity) · ru переполо́х (excited activity) · ru сумато́ха (excited activity) · ro turnură (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · bg суетня (excited activity) · fi taustalevy (cover to protect and hide the back panel of a computer or other office machine) · pt freneticidade (excited activity) · de Hektik (excited activity) · it andirivieni (excited activity) · fi vilinä (excited activity) · fr remue-ménage (excited activity) · no travelhet (excited activity) · pl bieganina (excited activity) · fi hyörintä (excited activity) · fi touhu (excited activity) · it sottana (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · fi vilske (excited activity) · es polisón (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · ro freamăt (excited activity) · ru суета́ (excited activity) · hy իրարանցում (excited activity) · de Turnüre (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · lv možums (excited activity) · mi pōwaiwai (excited activity) · sv turnyr (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · ja バッスル (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · fr tournure (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · bg турнюр (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · wa rimowe-manaedje (excited activity) · nl cul de Paris (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt) · it viavai (excited activity) · fr branlebas (excited activity) · es ajetreo (excited activity) · fr affairement (excited activity) · nrf tinné (excited activity) · fr agitation (excited activity) · lv rosme (excited activity) · fi turnyyri (frame worn underneath a woman's skirt)