different between bedlam vs bluster

English

Etymology

From Bedlam, alternative name of the English lunatic asylum, Bethlem Royal Hospital (royal hospital from 1375, mental hospital from 1403) (earlier St Mary of Bethlehem outside Bishopsgate, hospice in existence from 1329, priory established 1247), since used to mean “a place or situation of madness and chaos”. Bedlam as name of hospital attested 1450.

Phonologically, corruption of Bethlem, itself a corruption of Bethlehem (the Biblical town), from Ancient Greek ??????? (B?thleém) from Biblical Hebrew ????? ?????? (bê? le?em, literally “house of bread”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?b?dl?m/

Noun

bedlam (plural bedlams)

1. A place or situation of chaotic uproar, and where confusion prevails.
2. (obsolete) An insane person; a lunatic; a madman.
   • ca. 1605, William Shakespeare, King Lear, Act III, sc. 7:

     Let's follow the old Earl, and get the Bedlam

     To lead him where he would; his roguish madness

     Allows itself to anything.

   • 1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress, Christian overtakes Faithful:

     The pilgrims were clothed with such kind of raiment as was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair. The people, therefore, of the fair, made a great gazing upon them: some said they were fools, some they were bedlams, and some they are outlandish men.

3. (obsolete) A lunatic asylum; a madhouse.
   • 1824, Lord Byron, Don Juan, Canto XIV:lxxxiv:

     Shut up the world at large, let Bedlam out;

     And you will be perhaps surprised to find

     All things pursue exactly the same route,

     As now with those of soi-disant sound mind.

   • 1843, Charles Dickens, "A Christmas Carol":

     “There’s another fellow,” muttered Scrooge; who overheard him: “my clerk, with fifteen shillings a week, and a wife and family, talking about a merry Christmas. I’ll retire to Bedlam.”

   • ca. 1909, Mark Twain, Letters from the Earth, Letter II:

     ... only the holy can stand the joys of that bedlam.

Descendants

• ? Russian: ??????? (bedlám)

Translations

Further reading

• Bethlem Royal Hospital on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• bedlam in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• ambled, balmed, beldam, blamed, lambed

English

Etymology

From Middle English blusteren (“to wander about aimlessly”); however, apparently picking up the modern sense from Middle Low German blüstren (“to blow violently”; compare later Low German blustern, blistern). Related to blow, blast. Compare also Saterland Frisian bloasje (“to blow”), bruusje (“to bluster”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?bl?s.t?/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?bl?s.t?/
• (US)
• (General Australian)
• Rhymes: -?st?(r)

Noun

bluster (countable and uncountable, plural blusters)

1. Pompous, officious talk.
2. A gust of wind.
3. Fitful noise and violence.

Synonyms

• (pompous talk): bombast

Translations

Verb

bluster (third-person singular simple present blusters, present participle blustering, simple past and past participle blustered)

1. To speak or protest loudly.

2. To act or speak in an unduly threatening manner.
   • 1774, Edmund Burke, A Speech on American Taxation

     Your ministerial directors blustered like tragic tyrants.

   • 1532, Thomas More, Confutation of Tyndale's Answer

     He bloweth and blustereth out […] his abominable blasphemy.

   • As if therewith he meant to bluster all princes into a perfect obedience to his commands.

3. To blow in strong or sudden gusts.

Translations

Derived terms

Anagrams

• Butlers, Struble, brustle, bustler, butlers, subtler, turbels