busk

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to perform music or another form of entertainment in a public place for voluntary donations

   The violinist plans to busk outside the station on Saturday.

2. 2
   noun

   a Green Corn Ceremony, an annual first-fruits and renewal rite among the Muscogee and other Indigenous peoples of the southeastern United States

   Families returned to the ceremonial ground for the annual busk and communal feast.

Simplified etymology

Busk comes from Italian buscare or Spanish buscar, both meaning “to seek.” It first had nautical senses in English such as “cruise about,” “tack,” or “go from place to place seeking,” and by the mid-18th century had developed the slang sense “go about performing.”

The performance verb comes from obsolete French busquer, probably through Italian buscare or Spanish buscar, 'to seek'; a nautical sense 'cruise about' led to selling and then performing in public. The unrelated ceremonial noun is an English adaptation of Muscogee poskita or posketv, 'to fast,' referring to the fasting central to the Green Corn Ceremony.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary