bavin

Etymology

Perhaps Old French baffe (“a fagot”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbæ.vɪn/

Noun

bavin (plural bavins)

1. (Southern England, archaic) A bundle of wood, or twigs, which may be used in broom making. Also, a fagot bound with only one band.
   • 1578, Lyly, John, Euphues:

     […] that hot love is soon cold: that the bavin, though it burn bright, is but a blaze: that scalding water, it if stand awhile, turneth almost to ice […]

2. (Britain, dialect) Impure limestone
   • 1839: The Silurian System by Roderick Murchison, i. xxxvi. 484

     "The concretions…are called ˈbavin,ˈ the shale associated with them being termed ˈrotch.ˈ"

Adjective

bavin (comparative more bavin, superlative most bavin)

1. Made of firewood or kindling.
   • a. 1597, Shakespeare, William, Henry IV, Part 1, act 3, scene 2, lines 60–63:

     The skipping King, he ambled up and down, / With shallow jesters, and rash bavin wits, / Soon kindled and soon burnt, carded his state, / Mingled his royalty with capering fools,

Verb

bavin (third-person singular simple present bavins, present participle bavining, simple past and past participle bavined)

1. (Southern England, archaic) To bundle and bind wood into bavins.

Noun

bavin m (uncountable)

1. (Guernsey) nonsense, rubbish