bawd

English

Alternative forms

• baud
• baude

Etymology

From Middle English bawde, baude, from Old French baud (“bold, lively, jolly, gay”). Doublet of bold.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /bɔːd/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

• (US) enPR: bôd, IPA^(key): /bɔd/
• Rhymes: -ɔːd
• Homophones: board, bored (non-rhotic)

Noun

bawd (plural bawds)

1. (now archaic or historical) A person who keeps a house of prostitution, or procures women for prostitution; a procurer, a madame.
   • 1717, Ned Ward, British Wonders:

     As Whores decay'd and past their Labours, / Turn Bawds, and so assist their Neighbours.

   • 1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “The Author’s Oeconomy and Happy Life among the Houyhnhnms. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume II, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part IV (A Voyage to the Houyhnhnms), page 301:

     […] here were no Gibers, Cenſurers, Backbiters, Pick-pockets, Highwaymen, Houſebreakers, Attorneys, Bawds, Buffoons, Gameſters, Politicians, Wits, ſplenetick tedious Talkers, Controvertiſts, Raviſhers, Murderers, Robbers, Virtuoſo's; […]

   • 2012, Faramerz Dabhoiwala, The Origins of Sex, Penguin, published 2013, page 76:

     Compared with their opponents, bawds and their associates increasingly had deeper pockets and greater confidence in manipulating the law.

2. (obsolete, by extension) A person who facilitates an immoral act, especially one of a sexual nature.
   • 1594 (first publication), Christopher Marlow[e], The Trovblesome Raigne and Lamentable Death of Edvvard the Second, King of England: […], London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press] for Henry Bell, […], published 1622, →OCLC, [Act I]:

     In ſaying this thou wrongſt me Gaueſton, / Iſt not enough that thou corrupts my Lord, / And art a Bawd to his affections, / But thou muſt call mine honour thus in queſtion?

3. A lewd person.

Synonyms

• pimp

Derived terms

• bawdship
• cock-bawd
• pitcher-bawd

 

Adjective

bawd (comparative more bawd, superlative most bawd)

1. (obsolete) Joyous; riotously gay.

Verb

bawd (third-person singular simple present bawds, present participle bawding, simple past and past participle bawded)

1. (archaic) To procure women for lewd purposes.

Anagrams

• BWAD, dawb

Welsh

Etymology

From Middle Welsh mawd < Proto-Celtic *mā-to- < Proto-Indo-European *mē-. Compare Breton meud and Cornish meus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbau̯d/

Noun

bawd m or f (plural bodiau)

1. thumb
2. big toe
3. claw (of crab or lobster)
4. (in slate quarrying) a flaw or crack in the slate

   Synonyms: crych, las, bachiad

5. a bar projecting from rock face to which ropes are attached
6. (of a railway or tramway) points, turnouts

Mutation

Welsh mutation
radical	soft	nasal	aspirate
bawd	fawd	mawd	unchanged
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.