Forms: 3– barbican; 3 barbycon, berbikan, 4 -can, barbygan, 4–6 -can(e, 5 barbakane, 5–7 -cane, 6 barbicane, 7 -con. [a. F. barbacane, in 12th c. barbaquenne (= Pr., Sp. barbacana, Pg. barbacão, It. barbacane), of uncertain origin, perh. from Arab. or Pers.: barbār khānah is a possible Pers. combination, meaning ‘house on the wall,’ but examples of its actual use are wanting. Devic suggests Arab. barbakh canal or channel through which water flows, whence the sense ‘loop-hole’ might come. Littré gives as one sense in F., ‘ouverture longue et étroite pour l’écoulement des eaux,’ but sense 1 seems to be the earliest in OF. also. Col. Yule suggests Arab.-Pers. bāb-khānah ‘gate-house,’ the regular name in the east for a towered gateway; but it is not easy to derive from this the Romanic forms in bar-.]
1. An outer fortification or defence to a city or castle, esp. a double tower erected over a gate or bridge; often made strong and lofty, and serving as a watch-tower.
a. 1300. W. de Biblesw., in Wright, Voc., 130. Barbycons, antemuralia.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 10033. Þe berbikans [v.r. barbycans, -icans] seuen þat es a-bute, Þat standes thre bailles wit-vte … er þe seuen virtus.
c. 1320. Cast. Loue, 697. Seue berbicans þer beoþ i-wrouht … And euerichon haþ ȝat and tour.
1494. Fabyan, VII. 363. The Erle … made bulwerkes and barbycanys atwene the Toure and the cytie.
1596. Spenser, F. Q., II. ix. 25. Within the barbican a porter sate.
1633. T. Stafford, Pac. Hib., ii. (1821), 520. The Barbican whereof being a stone wall of sixteene foot in height.
1821. Scott, Kenilw., xxv. The usual entrance … over which he had erected a gate-house, or barbican.
fig. 1828. Scott, F. M. Perth, iv. Dawn seemed to abstain longer than usual from occupying her eastern barbican.
b. Retained as name of a street in London.
1632. Massinger, City Madam, II. i. A Barbican broker will furnish me with outside.
1656. Blount, Glossogr., s.v., Hence Barbican by Red-cross-street in London.
† 2. A temporary wooden tower or bulwark.
1489. Caxton, Faytes of A., II. xiv. 118. Barbakanes of tymbre shal be made fast to the batelmentes. Ibid., xxxviii. 161. In the grettest vesselles of werre men make towris and barbacanes.
† 3. A loophole in the wall of a castle or city, through which missiles might be discharged. Obs.
1600. Holland, Livy, XXIV. xxxiv. 532. He caused certaine barbacanes or loopeholes, almost a cubit deep … to be pierced through the wals.
