▪ I. buttress, n.
(ˈbʌtrɪs)
Forms: 4 butres, 5 boterace, boteras, butras, botrass, boterasse, (bountrace), botrase, 6 buttereis, butteras, bottras, butrese, butteresse, 6–7 buttresse, 7 buttrise, buttrice, boutrisse, 8 butteress, butteridge, 7– buttress.
[perh. a. OF. bouterez nom. sing. (or ? pl.) of bouteret, ‘flying-buttress’, ‘arc-boutant’ (Godef.); app. f. bouter to push, bear against.]
1. a. A structure of wood, stone, or brick built against a wall or building to strengthen or support it.
| 1388 Wyclif Ezek. xli. 15 He mat the boteraces on euer either side of an hundrid cubitis. 1393 Test. Ebor. (1836) I. 185 My body to be graven in the mynster-garth be-for the butres at the charnell. c 1440 Promp. Parv. 45 Boteras of a walle, machinis, muripula. 1487 Churchw. Acc. Wigtoft, Lincolnsh. (Nicholls 1797) 82 Lyme for mendyng and stoppyng of the Botrasses. 1501 Douglas Pal. Hon. 1437 Subtile muldrie wrocht mony day agone, On buttereis, jalme, pillaris. 1530 Palsgr. 432/2 This pyller within the churche answereth to this butteras without forthe. 1570 Levins Manip. 84 A Buttresse, fulcimentum. 1605 Shakes. Macb. i. vi. 7 No Jutty frieze, Buttrice, nor Coigne of Vantage. 1682 Wheler Journ. Greece iv. 296 The Pilaster..is propped on both sides with Buttrices. 1789 Smyth tr. Aldrich's Archit. (1818) 84 He proposes to erect brick buttresses at the angles. 1849 Freeman Archit. 157 A long dead wall, unbroken by porch or buttress. |
b. fig.
| 1436 Pol. Poems (1859) II. 187 Wyth alle youre myghte take hede To kepe Yrelond..Ffor it is a boterasse and a poste Undre England. 1550 Bale Image both Ch. F viij. 1639 Fuller Holy War v. xxv. (1840) 287 Though his title was builded on a bad foundation, yet it had strong buttresses. 1702 Eng. Theoph. 300 To transform those into butteresses of reputation, who threaten'd to ruin the same. |
2. loosely, A prop, support; a pier or abutment.
| 1609 Holland Amm. Marcell. xxiii. iv. 222 Under which piece of wood there lyeth a huge great boutrisse or supporter [fulmentum], even hayre-cloth stuffed full of, etc. 1745 tr. Columella's Husb. i. v, The foundations..will..serve as a butteridge and underpropping. 1850 Prescott Mexico I. 155 An aqueduct that was carried over hill and valley..on huge buttresses of masonry. |
3. A projecting portion of a hill or mountain looking like the buttress of a building.
| 1682 Wheler Journ. Greece vi. 453 It is..situated as it were between the two Buttrices of the Mountain. 1814 Cary Dante (1871) 145 We..stood Upon the second buttress of that mount. 1879 F. Malleson in Lett. to Clergy 51 The mountain and its opposing buttress the Dow Crags. |
4. Phys. a. Used as a translation of the F. éperon; b. a bony process or protuberance.
| 1836–9 Todd Cycl. Anat. II. 749/2 And between them [i.e. two portions of the bowel] is that double partition termed ‘eperon’ or buttress by Dupuytren. 1849–52 Ibid. IV. 894/2 Triangular plates of bone forming a zig-zag buttress. 1859 Ibid. V. 139/1 The pelvis presents two lateral curved thickened buttresses or columns. |
c. Bot. = buttress-root. (See quots.) Cf. buttress-root.
| 1900 B. D. Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms 39/1 Buttress, the knee-like growths of trunk or roots in certain trees. 1969 Gloss. Landscape Work (B.S.I.) v. 27 Buttress, a projecting growth linking the trunk of a tree to a major root. |
5. Fortification. (See quot.)
| 1802 James Milit. Dict., Fortification, Counter-forts..are by some called buttresses; they are solids of masonry, built behind walls, and joined to them at 18 feet distance from center to center, in order to strengthen them. |
6. Comb., as buttress-less, buttress-like adjs. buttress-root, = plank-buttress (see plank n. 7); buttress thread, a screw-thread having one face at right angles to the axis of the bolt or shaft. See also flying-buttress.
| 1882 Athenæum 1 Apr. 408/2 The buttressless tower of St. Stephen's. |
| 1853 Kane Grinnell Exp. xxxi, These escarped masses became more buttress-like and monumental. |
| 1914 M. Drummond tr. Haberlandt's Physiol. Plant Anat. iv. 188 This complex condition is exemplified by the stilt- or buttress-roots which occur in the genus Pandanus [etc.]. 1930 Discovery Nov. 381/1 Buttress roots [of trees] resemble thick planks and are often four or five feet in height at the trunk. 1964 J. P. Clark Three Plays 8 The burden was voided and buried In the crook of twin buttress roots. |
| 1887 D. A. Low Introd. Machine Drawing iii. 15 The Buttress thread..is designed to combine the advantages of the {logicor} and square threads. 1930 Engineering 6 June 721/2 In asymmetrical threads, such as..certain buttress threads. |
▪ II. ˈbuttress, v.
Also 5 boterace, boterase, 6 butteras, 7 buttresse.
[f. buttress n.]
1. To furnish, sustain, or strengthen with a buttress or support.
| 1377 [cf. b.]. 1530 Palsgr. 473/1 This buylding is butterassed very wel. 1843 Carlyle Past & Pr. ii. iii. (1872) 49 Stately masonries..buttress it. 1886 Athenæum 30 Oct. 574/1 The walls were buttressed with pillars. |
b. fig. Also with up.
| 1377 Langl. P. Pl. B. v. 598 Þe wallis ben..Boterased [A. vi. 79 brutaget] with bileue-so-or-þow-beest-nouȝte-ysaued. 1611 Speed Hist. Gt. Brit. ix. xx. (1632) 960 Arguments concurring to buttresse this affirmation. 1769 Burke Corr. (1844) I. 174 The plan of the court, would be..to buttress it [the ministry] up with the Grenvilles. 1882 C. Fox Mem. II. xv. 115 Some of the facts concerning America..buttressed their arguments. |
2. To conceal by a buttress from. rare.
| 1820 Keats St. Agnes ix, Beside the portal doors, Buttress'd from moonlight, stands he. |
Hence ˈbuttressing vbl. n. and ppl. a.
| 1851 Ruskin Stones Ven. I. xv. §11 The tiny buttressings look as if they carried the superstructure on the points of their pinnacles. 1881 Fifeshire Jrnl. 13 Jan. 4/3 Mr. Gladstone and..his buttressing factions. |