A glossary of Tudor and Stuart words, especially from the dramatists

by Walter W. Skeat

barratry, vexatious persistence in litigation. Butler, Hudibras, iii. 3. 695. See [baratour].

barrèd, misused for barded, i.e. caparisoned. Drayton, Pol. xii. 481. Shortened to bard; Dekker, O. Fortunatus, iii. 1 (Cornwall).

barred gown, a gown marked with stripes or bars of gold lace, like that of a judge or law-officer. Shirley, Bird in a Cage, i. 1 (Rolliardo).

barrendry, a barony, a title of a baron. Chapman, Humorous Day’s Mirth, p. 31. Anglo-F. baronnerie, a baronry, the domain of a baron, the rank or dignity of baron. See NED. (s.v. Baronry).

barriers, lists, as for a tournament. To fight at barriers, to fight within lists. ‘Jeu de Barres, a martial sport of men armed and fighting together with short swords within certain Barres or lists, whereby they are separated from the spectators’, Cowel’s Interpreter (ed. 1701). Webster, White Devil; ed. Dyce, p. 40; at p. 6, the ‘great barriers’ are said ‘to moult feathers’; alluding to the plumes cut from the helmets of the combatants.

barth, a warm place or pasture for calves or lambs. Tusser, Husbandry, § 33. 26; Coles, Dict., 1677. An E. Anglian word (EDD.). Prob. a derivative of OE. beorgan, to shelter, protect.

basciomani, kissings of the hand. Spenser, F. Q. iii. 1. 56. Ital. basciamano, a kissing of the hand (Florio).

base, or prison-bars, the name of a boys’ game. To bid base, to challenge to pursuit, as in the game, Venus and Adonis, 303; Spenser, F. Q. iii. 11. 5; at bace, id. v. 8. 5. ‘Barres, play at bace, or prison Bars’, Cotgrave. ME. bace, play, ‘barri’ (Prompt. EETS. 24, see note no. 100). ‘Barri sunt ludi, anglicè bace’ (Wright, Vocab. 176; foot-note).

bases, pl. (used like skirts), applied to a plaited skirt of cloth, velvet, or rich brocade, appended to the doublet, and reaching from the waist to the knee, common in the Tudor period. Massinger, Picture, ii. 1 (Sophia); Chapman, Mask of the Inner Temple, § 2. Called ‘a pair of bases’, Pericles, ii. 1. 167.

bash, to be abashed, Greene, Looking Glasse, i. 1. 3; Peele, Arraignment of Paris, iv. 1 (Venus); to make abashed, Greene, Looking Glasse, i. 1. 75 (Rasni). In prov. use in both senses, see EDD. (s.v. vb.³).