Bast

Pronunciation

• IPA: /bæst/

Origin

From Middle English, from Old English bæst ("bast, inner bark of trees from which ropes were made"), from Proto-Germanic *bastaz ("bast, rope") (compare the Swedish bast, Dutch bast, German Bast), perhaps an alteration of Proto-Indo-European *bʰask-, *bʰasḱ- ("bundle") (compare Middle Irish basc ("necklace"), Latin fascis ("bundle"), Albanian bashkë ("tied, linked")).

Full definition of bast

Noun

1. Fibre made from the phloem of certain plants and used for matting and cord.
• 1918, W. B. Maxwell, The Mirror and the Lamp Chapter 19, At the far end of the houses the head gardener stood waiting for his mistress, and he gave her strips of bass to tie up her nosegay. This she did slowly and laboriously, with knuckly old fingers that shook.
• 1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth, Duckworth, hardback edition, page 87I thought I saw Him in the Long Walk there, by the bed of Nelly Roche, tending a fallen flower with a wisp of bast.
• 1997: ‘Egil's Saga’, tr. Bernard Scudder, The Sagas of Icelanders, Penguin 2001, page 145He had taken along a long bast rope in his sleigh, since it was the custom on longer journeys to have a spare rope in case the reins needed mending.

Anagrams

• ATBs
• bats
• stab
• tabs