Bombast

5 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Bombast \Bom"bast\ (b[o^]m"b[.a]st or b[u^]m"b[.a]st; 277), n.
     [OF. bombace cotton, LL. bombax cotton, bombasium a doublet
     of cotton; hence, padding, wadding, fustian. See
     {Bombazine}.]
     1. Originally, cotton, or cotton wool. [Obs.]
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              A candle with a wick of bombast.      --Lupton.
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     2. Cotton, or any soft, fibrous material, used as stuffing
        for garments; stuffing; padding. [Obs.]
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              How now, my sweet creature of bombast! --Shak.
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              Doublets, stuffed with four, five, or six pounds of
              bombast at least.                     --Stubbes.
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     3. Fig.: High-sounding words; an inflated style; language
        above the dignity of the occasion; fustian.
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              Yet noisy bombast carefully avoid.    --Dryden.
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Bombast \Bom"bast\, a.
     High-sounding; inflated; big without meaning; magniloquent;
     bombastic.
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           [He] evades them with a bombast circumstance,
           Horribly stuffed with epithets of war.   --Shak.
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           Nor a tall metaphor in bombast way.      --Cowley.
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Bombast \Bom*bast"\ (b[o^]m*b[.a]st" or b[u^]m*b[.a]st"), v. t.
     To swell or fill out; to pad; to inflate. [Obs.]
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           Not bombasted with words vain ticklish ears to feed.
                                                    --Drayton.
     [1913 Webster] Bombastic

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  bombast
       n : pompous or pretentious talk or writing [syn: {fustian}, {rant},
            {claptrap}, {blah}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  90 Moby Thesaurus words for "bombast":
     absurdity, amphigory, babble, babblement, balderdash,
     bibble-babble, blabber, blather, bluster, boast, boastfulness,
     boasting, bombastry, brag, braggadocio, braggartism, bragging,
     bravado, claptrap, conceit, double-talk, drivel, drool,
     fanfaronade, fiddle-faddle, fiddledeedee, flatulence, flummery,
     folderol, fudge, fustian, gabble, galimatias, gammon, gasconade,
     gasconism, gibber, gibberish, gibble-gabble, gobbledygook,
     grandiloquence, heroics, highfalutin, hocus-pocus, hot air, humbug,
     jabber, jactation, jactitation, jargon, lexiphanicism,
     magniloquence, mumbo jumbo, narrishkeit, niaiserie, nonsense,
     orotundity, pack of nonsense, palaver, prate, prattle, puffery,
     pyrotechnics, rant, rhapsody, rhetoric, rigamarole, rigmarole,
     rodomontade, rubbish, sesquipedality, show, side, skimble-skamble,
     stuff and nonsense, stultiloquence, swagger, trash, trumpery,
     tumidity, turgidity, twaddle, twattle, twiddle-twaddle, vanity,
     vaporing, vaunt, vauntery, vaunting, waffling