burst
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /bɝst/
ipa: /bɜːst/
rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)st
Forms: form: bursts
form: bursting
form: burst
form: brast
form: bursted
form: burst
form: brast
form: bursted
form: bursten
form: brast
form: brust
Etymology: From Middle English bresten, bersten, from Old English berstan, from Proto-West Germanic *brestan, from Proto-Germanic *brestaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰres- (“to burst, break, crack, split, separate”), enlargement of *bʰreHi- (“to snip, split”).
See also West Frisian boarste, Dutch barsten, Danish briste, Swedish brista; also Irish bris (“to break”)). More at brine. Also cognate to debris.
Senses: examples: text: I blew the balloon up too much, and it burst.
glosses: To break from internal pressure.
examples: text: I burst the balloon when I blew it up too much.
glosses: To cause to break from internal pressure.
examples: text: You will not pay for the glasses you have burst?
ref: c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act INDUCTION, scene i]:
text: He burst his lance against the sand below.
ref: 1600, [Torquato Tasso], “(please specify |book=1 to 20)”, in Edward Fairefax [i.e., Edward Fairfax], transl., Godfrey of Bulloigne, or The Recouerie of Ierusalem. […], London: […] Ar[nold] Hatfield, for I[saac] Iaggard and M[atthew] Lownes, →OCLC:
glosses: To cause to break by any means.
examples: text: I printed the report on form-feed paper, then burst the sheets.
glosses: To separate (printer paper) at perforation lines.
examples: 1913, Mariano Azuela, The Underdogs, translated by E. MunguÍa, Jr.
Like hungry dogs who have sniffed their meat, the mob bursts in, trampling down the women who sought to bar the entrance with their bodies.
glosses: To enter or exit hurriedly and unexpectedly.
examples: text: The flowers burst into bloom on the first day of spring.
text: ‘[…] I remember a lady coming to inspect St. Mary's Home where I was brought up and seeing us all in our lovely Elizabethan uniforms we were so proud of, and bursting into tears all over us because “it was wicked to dress us like charity children”. […]’.
ref: 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 6, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:
glosses: To erupt; to change state suddenly as if bursting.
examples: text: to burst a hole through the wall
text: 1856, Eleanor Marx-Aveling (translator), Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary, Part III Chapter X
He entered Maromme shouting for the people of the inn, burst open the door with a thrust of his shoulder, made for a sack of oats, emptied a bottle of sweet cider into the manger, and again mounted his nag, whose feet struck fire as it dashed along.
glosses: To produce as an effect of bursting.
examples: text: The sharp report of a gun burst the silence, and a moment later the gate swung open.
ref: 2001, Jeanette Windle, Cave of the Inca Re, page 115:
glosses: To interrupt suddenly in a violent or explosive manner; to shatter.
Coordinate terms: split
crack
Derived terms: aburst
bank-bursting
burstability
burstable
burst a blood vessel
burst at the seams
burster
burst forth
burst in
bursting pressure
burst into
burst into flame
burst into flames
burst into flower
burst into tears
burst out
burst out laughing
burst someone's bubble
burst up
fit to burst
forburst
reburst
unburst
Related terms: bust