Obs. Forms: 4–5 burde, 4–7 bord(e, bourd(e, 5 bouerd, 5–6 bowrd(e, 5–7 boord(e, 7 boward. [ME. bourde, a. OF. bourde, Pr. borda ‘lie, cheating, deception,’ of unknown origin.
Diez’s proposed identification of OF. bourde with behort ‘tournament, tilting,’ is discarded; for ‘bourde goes back to a date before the contraction of behourt to bourt could have taken place, and originally there was no connexion of sense’ (P. Meyer). At a later time behourder was contracted to behourder, bourder, and thus brought into confusion with this word and its verb bourder: see BOURD v.]
An idle tale, a jest, a joke; jesting, raillery, joking, merriment, fun; a merry tale.
c. 1340. Gaw. & Gr. Knt., 1212. Al laȝande þe lady lanced þo bourdez.
1387. Trevisa, Higden, Rolls Ser. IV. 143. He wolde torne hit to bourde and lawȝhynge.
1430. Lydg., Chron. Troy, II. xvi. All his speche ful of bouerdes was. Ibid. (c. 1430), Min. Poems, 57. To be forsworn they hold it but a bord.
a. 1450. Knt. de la Tour (1868), 111. The kingges doughter … called hym in bourde her sone.
c. 1520. King & Barker, 110, in Hazl., E. P. P., 9. Owr kyng lowhe, and had god bord.
1548. Cranmer, Catech., 25 b. I spake not these wourdes in ernest but in borde.
1593. Drayton, Eclog., VII. 208. For all thy Jests, and all thy merrie Bourds.
1606. Holland, Sueton., 63. Either in earnest or boord [vel serio vel joco].
b. In a bad sense: Mockery, bantering. (Probably the earlier sense, as in French.)
1320–30. Lai le Freine, 9. Bourdes and ribaudy.
1340. Ayenb., 56. Þanne byeþ þe burdes and þe trufles uor entremes.
1483. Caxton, G. de la Tour, B vj b. Al was taken for a bourd and a mocquerye.
a. 1541. Wyatt, in Tottel’s Misc. (Arb.), 51. Nought moueth you my dedly mone, But stil you turne it into bordes.
1602. Fulbecke, 1st Pt. Parall., 71. If a man … should strike an other or vse broad boward against him.
c. Play, game.
1362. Langl., P. Pl., A. X. 197. Bi-twene Mon and wommon Schulde no Bed-bourde be.
1530. Palsgr., 199/2. Bourde or game, jeu.
