buckram

• POS: Noun, Verb (usu participle)
• HYPHEN: buck=ram

CIDE DICTIONARY

buckram, n. [OE. bokeram, bougeren, OF. boqueran, F. bougran, MHG. buckeram, LL. buchiranus, boquerannus, fr. MHG. boc, G. bock, goat (as being made of goat's hair), or fr. F. bouracan, by transposing the letter r. See Buck, Barracan.].

•  A coarse cloth of linen or hemp, stiffened with size or glue, used in garments to keep them in the form intended, and for wrappers to cover merchandise.  [1913 Webster]

  " Buckram was formerly a very different material from that now known by the name. It was used for wearing apparel, etc."  Beck (Draper's Dict. ).  [1913 Webster]
•  A plant. See Ramson.  Dr. Prior.  [1913 Webster]

buckram, a. 

•  Made of buckram; as, a buckram suit.  [1913 Webster]
•  Stiff; precise.  Brooke.  [1913 Webster]

buckram, v. t. 

 To strengthen with buckram; to make stiff.  Cowper.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

buckram, n. & adj.
--n.
1 a coarse linen or other cloth stiffened with gum or paste, and used as interfacing or in bookbinding.
2 archaic stiffness in manner.
--adj. archaic starchy; formal.

Idiom

men in buckram a figment (Shakesp.
1 Henry IV II. iv. 210-50).

Etymology

ME f. AF bukeram, OF boquerant, perh. f. Bokhara in central Asia

ROGET THESAURUS

buckram

Affectation

N affectation, affectedness, acting a part, pretense boasting, charlatanism, quackery, shallow profundity, pretension, airs, pedantry, purism, precisianism, euphuism, teratology, mannerism, simagree, grimace, conceit, foppery, dandyism, man millinery, coxcombry, puppyism, stiffness, formality, buckram, prudery, demureness, coquetry, mock modesty, minauderie, sentimentalism, mauvais honte, false shame, affector, performer, actor, pedant, pedagogue, doctrinaire, purist, euphuist, mannerist, grimacier, lump of affectation, precieuse ridicule, bas bleu, blue stocking, poetaster, prig, charlatan, petit maitre, flatterer, coquette, prude, puritan, affected, full of affectation, pretentious, pedantic, stilted, stagy, theatrical, big-sounding, ad captandum, canting, insincere, not natural, unnatural, self-conscious, maniere, artificial, overwrought, overdone, overacted, euphuist, stiff, starch, formal, prim, smug, demure, tire a quatre epingles, quakerish, puritanical, prudish, pragmatical, priggish, conceited, coxcomical, foppish, dandified, finical, finikin, mincing, simpering, namby-pamby, sentimental, conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.