# bustle
## English
### 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”).

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /ˈbʌsəl/
* Audio (Southern England):(file)
* Rhymes: -ʌsəl

### Noun

bustle (countable and uncountable, plural bustles)
* (countable, uncountable) An excited activity; a stir.
** 1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral., London: Oxford University Press, published 1973, § 34:we are, perhaps, all the while flattering our natural indolence, which, hating the bustle of the world, and drudgery of business seeks a pretence of reason to give itself a full and uncontrolled indulgence.
** 1755, Adam Fitz-Adam, The World, number CXXI, London, page 789: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[.]
* (computing, countable) A cover to protect and hide the back panel of a computer or other office machine.
* (historical, countable) A frame worn underneath a woman's skirt, typically only protruding from the rear as opposed to the earlier more circular hoops.
** 2006, Peter Godwin, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa: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.

#### Derived terms

* bustlesome
* bustly
* hustle and bustle, hustle-bustle

#### Translations
### Verb

bustle (third-person singular simple present bustles, present participle bustling, simple past and past participle bustled)
* To move busily and energetically with fussiness (often followed by about).
    The commuters bustled about inside the train station.
** 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 3, member 6:I was once so mad to bussell abroad, and seek about for preferment […].
* To teem or abound (usually followed by with); to exhibit an energetic and active abundance (of a thing).
    The train station was bustling with commuters.
* (transitive) To push around, to importune.
** 1981, A. D. Hope, “His Coy Mistress to Mr. Marvell”, in A Book of Answers:Don’t bustle her or fuss or snatch: / A suitor looking at his watch / Is not a posture that persuades / Willing, much less reluctant maids.

#### Synonyms

* (to move busily): flit, hustle, scamper, scurry
* (to exhibit an energetic abundance): abound, brim, bristle, burst, crawl, swell, teem

#### Derived terms

* abustle
* bustler
* outbustle

#### Translations
### References

* ↑ bustle in Merriam-Webster Dictionary

### Anagrams

* bluest, bluets, butles, sublet, subtle