† ˈbombace, -ase Obs.
Forms: 6 bombage, 6–7 bombase, -bace.
[a. OF. bombace cotton, cotton wadding:—late L. bombāce-m, acc. of bombax cotton, a corruption and transferred use of L. bombyx silk, a. Gr. βόµβυξ silkworm, silk.]
1. The down of the cotton-plant; raw cotton.
| 1553 Eden Treat. New Ind. (Arb.) 13 This cotton, is otherwyse called Bombage or sylke of the trees. Ibid. 30 They tie the postes together with ropes of bombage cotton. 1578 Lyte Dodoens vi. xvii. 679 Fayre white cotton, or the downe that we call Bombace. 1579 Langham Gard. Health (1633) 536 The oile is to be taken away with bombase or cotton dipt in it. 1609 Harington Schoole Salerne (1624) 358 To vse garments of Silke or Bombace. |
2. Cotton fibre dressed for stuffing or padding garments; cotton-wool, cotton-wadding.
| 1592 Wills & Inv. N.C. (1860) II. 212, xx yds. of course harden 6s. 6d. v lbs. of bombace 5s. 1635 J. Hayward Banish'd Virg. 149 A body that needed not the common helpes of rectifying its proportion by bombace or the like. |
3. fig. Padding, stuffing: see bombast n. 2 b, 3.
| 1662 Fuller Worthies (1840) III. 34 A sermon..to the university, the stuff, or rather bombace, whereof we have set down in our ‘Ecclesiastical History’. |