bucksome

English

Etymology

From Middle English buxum, buhsum (“flexible, bendsome”). Often analysed, due to confusion with the verb buck (“to spring, buckle, kick violently”) and buck (“he-goat”), as though from buck +‎ -some. Doublet of buxom.

Adjective

bucksome (comparative more bucksome, superlative most bucksome)

1. Archaic form of buxom.
2. Marked by bucking or bucking up; (by extension) lively; brisk; jocund.
   • 1608, Robert Armin, Nest of Ninnies:

     Shee now begins to grow bucksome as a lightning before death.

3. Spirited or lively, like a buck.
   • 2010, Ruth Alberta Brown, Heart of Gold:

     "Bucksome," repeated Peace, with the picture of a bucking billy goat uppermost in her mind, and wondering how a maiden could be bucksome.