boast

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   To talk proudly about yourself or what you have done.

   He boasted about his new car all evening.

2. 2
   verb

   (of a place or thing) To have something good worth being proud of.

   The hotel boasts one of the best views of the sea.

3. 3
   noun

   Something you say proudly about yourself.

   It was his regular boast that he never got sick.

From Middle English bosten, from bost (“boast, glory, noise, arrogance, presumption, pride, vanity”), probably of North Germanic origin, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *bausuz (“inflated, swollen, puffed up, proud, arrogant, bad”). Cognate with Scots bost, boist (“to threaten, brag, boast”), Anglo-Norman bost (“ostentation”) (from Germanic). Related to Norwegian baus (“proud, bold, daring”), dialectal German baustern (“to swell”), German böse (“evil, bad, angry”), Dutch boos (“evil, wicked, angry”), West Frisian boas (“bad, wicked, angry, shrewd, clever”). Compare also dialectal Norwegian baus…

Topics