fustian
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈfʌs.tɪ.ən/
ipa: /ˈfʌs.tʃən/
ipa: /ˈfʌs.t͡ʃən/
Forms: form: more fustian
form: most fustian
Etymology: The noun is derived from Middle English fustian (“type of fabric, probably made from cotton, flax, or wool; piece of fustian spread over a bed or mattress”) [and other forms], from Old French fustaine, fustaigne (modern French futaine), from Medieval Latin fūstāneum, from (pannus) fūstāneus or (tela) fūstānea, of disputed origin.
Sense 3 (“inflated, pompous, or pretentious speech or writing”) is possibly from the fact that the fabric was sometimes used to make cushion- and pillowcases, thus suggesting that the speech or writing is “padded” or “stuffed”; compare bombast. The relationship between sense 4 (“hot drink made of a mixture of alcoholic beverages with egg yolk, lemon, and spices”) and the fabric is unclear.
The adjective is from an attributive use of the noun.
Cognates
* Italian fustagno
* Occitan fustani
* Portuguese fustão
* Spanish fustan
Senses: examples: text: I was never ſo ſplenetique, when I was moſt dumpiſh, but I could ſmile at a friſe jeſt, when the good man would be pleaſurable, and laugh at fuſtion earneſt, when the merry man would be ſurly.
ref: 1593, Gabriell Haruey [i.e., Gabriel Harvey], Pierces Supererogation: Or A New Prayse of the Old Asse. A Preparative to Certaine Larger Discourses, Intituled Nashes S. Fame, London: […] Iohn Wolfe, →OCLC; republished as John Payne Collier, editor, Pierces Supererogation: Or A New Prayse of the Old Asse. […] (Miscellaneous Tracts. Temp. Eliz. & Jac. I; no. 8), [London]: [s.n.], [1870], →OCLC, page 161:
text: For my clothes being but a threed-bare fuſtian caſe vvere ſo meane (my cloake onely excepted) that the Boores could not haue made an ordinary ſupper vvith the mony for vvᶜʰ they ſhould haue ſold them; […]
ref: 1611, Thomas Coryate [i.e., Thomas Coryat], “My Obseruations of Argentina or Argentoratum, Commonly Called Strasbourg the Metropolitan City of Alsatia”, in Coryats Crudities Hastily Gobled Vp in Five Moneths Trauells […], London: […] W[illiam] S[tansby for the author], →OCLC, page 465, lines 14–18:
text: About a fortnight since, as I was diverting myself with a pennyworth of walnuts at the Temple-gate, a lively young fellow in a fustian jacket shot by me, beckoned a coach, and told the coachman he wanted to go as far as Chelsea.
ref: 1712 October 12 (Gregorian calendar), [Richard Steele], “WEDNESDAY, October 1, 1712. To the Spectator-General of Great Britain.”, in The Spectator, number 498; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume V, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 449:
text: [F]or all my bit of a fuſtian frock, that coſt me in all but forty ſhillings, I believe, betvveen you and me, knight, I have more duſt in my fob, than all theſe povvdered ſparks put together.
ref: 1753, [Tobias Smollett], “He Overlooks the Advances of His Friends, and Smarts Severely for His Neglect”, in The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom. […], volume I, London: […] W. Johnston, […], →OCLC, page 156:
text: He was soon at ease with his honest host, whose manners were quite simple and cordial, and who looked and seemed perfectly a gentleman, though he wore a plain fustian coat, and a waistcoat without a particle of lace.
ref: 1857–1858, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, “In Hospital”, in The Virginians. A Tale of the Last Century, volume I, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1858, →OCLC, page 170:
text: [S]he was conscious of a rough coffin passing her shoulder, borne by four men. It was open, and in it lay the body of a young man, wearing the smockfrock of a rustic, and fustian breeches.
ref: 1888 January, Thomas Hardy, “The Withered Arm”, in Wessex Tales: Strange, Lively, and Commonplace […], volume I, London; New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published 1888, →OCLC, chapter IX (A Rencounter), pages 121–122:
text: His fustian shirt, sanguineflowered, trembles its Spanish tassels at his secrets.
ref: 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 3: Proteus]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC, part I [Telemachia], page 43:
text: Her husband was trying to calm her down, assuage her, and in the end what she did was to put a handkerchief over her face and secure it with the brim of a fustian hat.
ref: 1972, Edna O’Brien, Night, revised edition, New York, N.Y.: Farrar Straus Giroux, published 1987, →ISBN, page 103:
glosses: Made out of fustian (noun sense 1).
examples: text: Monélle, a roguiſh or fustian word, a word in pedlers French, ſignifying wenches, ſtrumpets or whores.
ref: 1598, John Florio, “Monélle”, in A Worlde of Words, or Most Copious, and Exact Dictionarie in Italian and English, […], London: […] Arnold Hatfield for Edw[ard] Blount, →OCLC, page 231, column 1:
text: Svb[tle]. VVhy, you muſt entertaine him. Fac[e]. VVhat'll you doe / VVith theſe the vvhile? Svb. VVhy, haue 'hem vp, and ſhew 'hem / Some Fuſtian Booke, or the Darke Glaſſe.
ref: 1610 (first performance), Ben[jamin] Jonson, The Alchemist, London: […] Thomas Snodham, for Walter Burre, and are to be sold by Iohn Stepneth, […], published 1612, →OCLC, Act IV, scene ii:
text: VVherein by the way let me pray thee to obſerue that I haue alſo inſerted […] euen of the fuſtian termes, vſed by too many vvho ſtudy rather to bee heard ſpeake, than to vnderſtand themſelues.
ref: 1623, H[enry] C[ockeram], “A Premonition from the Author to the Reader”, in The English Dictionarie: or, An Interpreter of Hard English VVords. […], London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press] for Edmund Weauer, […], →OCLC, signature A4, verso:
text: And why wou'dſt thou theſe mightly Morſels chuſe, / Of Words unchaw'd, and fit to choak the Muſe? / Let Fuſtian Poets with their Stuff be gone, / And ſuck the Miſts that hang o're Helicon; […]
ref: 1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, W. Bowles, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Fifth Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […] Together with the Satires of Aulus Persius Flaccus. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC, page 60:
text: [Alexander] Pope, after censuring the haste, negligence, and fustian language of [George] Chapman, observes "that which is to be allowed him, and which very much contributed to cover his defects, is a free daring spirit that animates his translation, which is something like what one might imagine Homer himself would have written before he arrived at years of discretion."
ref: 1837–1839, Henry Hallam, “History of Poetry from 1550 to 1600”, in Introduction to the Literature of Europe, in the Fifteenth, Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, volume II, London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, section IV (On English Poetry), paragraph 73, page 318:
synonyms: word: circumlocutory
word: diffuse
word: periphrastic
word: palaverous
word: pleonastic
word: prolix
word: rigmarole
word: sesquipedalian
word: verbose
word: wordy
antonyms: word: verbose
glosses: Of a person, or their speech or writing: using inflated, pompous, or pretentious language; bombastic; grandiloquent; also (obsolete) using incoherent or unintelligible language.
examples: text: [T]he Scene, Gargaphie: vvhich I doe vehemently ſuſpect for ſome fuſtian countrie, but let that vaniſh.
ref: 1600 (first performance), Beniamin Ionson [i.e., Ben Jonson], “Cynthias Reuels, or The Fountayne of Selfe-Loue. […]. [Induction. By Three of the Children.]”, in The Workes of Beniamin Ionson (First Folio), London: […] Will[iam] Stansby, published 1616, →OCLC, page 182:
glosses: Imaginary; invented.
examples: text: Hard to make ought of that is nakid nought; / This fustiane maistres and this giggisse gase, / Wonder is to wryte what wrenchis she wrowght, / To face out her foly with a midsomer mase; […]
ref: 1523, John Skelton, “A Ryght Delectable Tratyse vpon a Goodly Garlande or Chapelet of Laurell, […]”, in Alexander Dyce, editor, The Poetical Works of John Skelton: […], volume I, London: Thomas Rodd, […], published 1843, →OCLC, page 410, lines 1205–1208:
text: For Gods ſake thruſt him down ſtaires, I cannot indure ſuch a fuſtian raſcall.
ref: c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, The Second Part of Henrie the Fourth, […], quarto edition, London: […] V[alentine] S[immes] for Andrew Wise, and William Aspley, published 1600, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iv]:
glosses: Useless; worthless.