Brusque comes from French brusque ('lively, rough'), from Italian brusco ('sharp, tart, brusque'), originally the name of a sharp-tasting plant (butcher's broom), from Late Latin bruscus. The historical trail runs through brusque in French and brusco in Italian. Used as an adjective, brusque now means "abrupt or curt in manner or speech", so the present definition can be read against the older forms and meanings. The same lexical family is also visible in derived forms such as brusquely and brusqueness and related forms such as brisk. The result is a borrowed or transmitted form whose modern spelling carries a compact record of its route into English.