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 fiber 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 sb. 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.’
