burlap
Plural: burlaps
Noun
- A coarse, plain-woven fabric, typically made from jute or hemp.
- coarse jute fabric
- A very strong, coarse cloth, made from jute, flax, or hemp, and used to make sacks, etc.
Verb
- To wrap or cover in burlap.
Examples
- His strategy felt as rough and unrefined as burlap until he found a perfect word.
Origin / Etymology
Uncertain. Attested since about 1695 in the spelling bore-lap, borelapp. Likely from burel (“a coarse woollen cloth”) + lap (“flap of a garment”), where the first element is from Middle English burel, borel. Others feel that "its character and time of appearance makes a Dutch origin very likely" (and the earliest references as to its importation from the Netherlands); the NED suggests derivation from Dutch boenlap (“coarse, rubbing linen or cloth”) with the first element perhaps confused with boer (“farmer, peasant”). Bense similarly suggests derivation from an unattested Dutch *boerenlap, where boeren would be used in the sense of “coarse” as in boerenkost (“coarse, heavy food as is eaten by farmers”) or boerenpraat (“coarse, rural speech”).
Scrabble Score: 10
burlap: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordburlap: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
burlap: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary