Table of Contents
The word for today is…
brusque (adjective):
1: markedly short and abrupt
2: blunt in manner or speech often to the point of ungracious harshness
Source : Merriam -Webster
Etymology : If you’ve ever felt swept aside by someone with a brusque manner, that makes a certain amount of etymological sense. Brusque, you see, comes ultimately from bruscus, the Medieval Latin name for butcher’s broom, a shrub whose bristly, leaf-like twigs have long been used for making brooms. Bruscus was modified to the adjective brusco in Italian, where it meant “sour” or “tart.” French, in turn, changed brusco to brusque, and the word in that form entered English in the 1600s. English speakers initially applied brusque to tartness in wine, but the word soon came to describe a harsh and stiff manner, which is just what you might expect of a word bristling with associations to stiff, scratchy brooms.
If you enjoyed this BFD word of the day please consider sharing it with your friends and, especially, your children.
