bread-corn
(ˈbrɛdkɔːn)
1. Corn or grain for making bread. An expression that comes down from a time when ‘corn’ had a much wider sense than it now bears in England or America; cf. peppercorn, and in OE. senepes corn mustard seed.
| 1362 Langl. P. Pl. A. vii. 58 A Busschel of Bred corn he bringeþ þer-Inne. 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xvii. lxiv, Many medle benes with bred corne, to make þe bred þe more heuy. 1610 P. Holland Camden's Brit. ii. 219 The inhabitants..use in steed of bread-corne, dried fish. 1770 Langhorne Plutarch (1879) I. 251/2 A great quantity of bread-corn was brought into Rome. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) I. 477 Rye..the bread-corn of Germany and Russia. 1857 E. Acton Eng. Bread-bk. iv. 53. |
2. spec. ‘Corn to be ground into bread-meal, not to be used for finer purposes’ (N. Linc. Gloss.).
| attrib. 1669 Boyle Contn. New Exp. ii. (1682) 28, I made Paste of Bread-corn-meal, without Leaven. |