bavin

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English

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Etymology

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Perhaps Old French baffe (a faggot).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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bavin (countable and uncountable, plural bavins)

  1. (Southern England, archaic, countable) A bundle of wood or twigs, which may be used in broom-making.
    • 1578, John Lyly, Euphues:
      [] that hot love is soon cold: that the bavin, though it burn bright, is but a blaze: that scalding water, it if stand awhile, turneth almost to ice []
    1. (Southern England, archaic, countable) A faggot bound with only one band.
  2. (UK, dialect, uncountable) Impure limestone.
    • 1839, Roderick Murchison, The Silurian System, i. xxxvi. 484:
      The concretions [] are called 'bavin,' the shale associated with them being termed 'rotch.'

Verb

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bavin (third-person singular simple present bavins, present participle bavining, simple past and past participle bavined)

  1. (Southern England, archaic) To bundle and bind wood into bavins.

Adjective

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bavin (not comparable)

  1. Made of firewood or kindling.
    • a. 1597, William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 1, act 3, scene 2, lines 60–63:
      The skipping King, he ambled up and down, / With shallow jesters, and rash bavin wits, / Soon kindled and soon burnt, carded his state, / Mingled his royalty with capering fools,

Norman

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Etymology

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(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

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bavin m (uncountable)

  1. (Guernsey) nonsense, rubbish