buss
Valid in Scrabble
- Scrabble points
- 6
- Words With Friends
- 8
- Letters
- 4
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Definition of buss
8 senses · 3 parts of speech · etymology included
noun
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(archaic)A kiss.
“Here he gave Jones a hearty buss, shook him by the hand, and took his leave.”
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noun
-
(archaic)A kiss.
“Here he gave Jones a hearty buss, shook him by the hand, and took his leave.”
-
A herring buss, a type of shallow-keeled Dutch fishing boat used especially for herring fishing.
“the Dutch whalers and herring busses”
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(alt-of, archaic)Archaic form of bus (“passenger vehicle”).
“1838, Charles Dickens, "Omnibuses", Sketches by Boz We will back the machine in which we make our daily peregrination from the top of Oxford-street to the city, against any buss on the road, whether it be for the gaudiness of its exterior, the perfect simplicity of its interior, or the native coolness of its cad.”
- (alt-of, alternative, slang)Alternative form of bussing (“enjoyable, delicious”)
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(archaic, slang)A blunderbuss.
“By the immortal powers, if you had let Rory put a few slugs into the old buss, he'd have settled the baronet's hash altogether.”
verb
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(dialectal, often, poetic, transitive)To kiss (either literally or figuratively).
“I will thinke thou smil'st, And busse thee as thy wife.”
“'I take the privilege, Mistress Ruth, of saluting you.' ...And therewith I bussed her well.”
“As the repatriated explorer dodges down to buss the earth […] he is so thoroughly caught up in the rhapsody of the moment that he fails to take into account the traffic behind him.”
“Sam...really was six-ten and his head bussed the ceiling.”
-
(intransitive)To kiss.
“In the faint glow of a single blue bulb hanging from a clothesline they bussed and fondled.”
name
- A surname.
Definitions from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA.
Etymology
Uncertain. First attested in the 1560s. Possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰus- (“lip, to kiss”) via Proto-Germanic *busaną (compare German bussen), but in any case imitative of kissing. Compare Welsh bus (“kiss,…
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Uncertain. First attested in the 1560s. Possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰus- (“lip, to kiss”) via Proto-Germanic *busaną (compare German bussen), but in any case imitative of kissing. Compare Welsh bus (“kiss, lip”) and Irish bus (“lips, mouth”) (both may have influenced English), Persian بوس (bus, “kiss”), Latvian buča (“kiss”), Latin basium (“kiss”). Mainstream proposals like in The Free Dictionary have suggested it is a blend of old English dialect words bass (related to French baiser) and cuss (akin to kissen); perhaps compare puss.
Words you can make from buss
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