fustian

Meaning

1. Originally, a kind of coarse fabric made from cotton and flax; now, a kind of coarse twilled cotton, or cotton and linen, stuff with a short pile and often dyed a dull colour, which is chiefly prepared for menswear.
2. A class of fabric including corduroy and velveteen.
3. Inflated, pompous, or pretentious speech or writing; bombast; also (archaic), incoherent or unintelligible speech or writing; gibberish, nonsense.
4. Chiefly in rum fustian: a hot drink made of a mixture of alcoholic beverages (as beer, gin, and sherry or white wine) with egg yolk, lemon, and spices.
5. Made out of fustian (noun sense 1).
6. Of a person, or their speech or writing: using inflated, pompous, or pretentious language; bombastic; grandiloquent; also (obsolete) using incoherent or unintelligible language.
7. Imaginary; invented.
8. Useless; worthless.

Etymology / origin

The noun is derived from Middle English fustian (“type of fabric, probably made from cotton, flax, or wool; piece of fustian spread over a bed or mattress”) [and other forms], from Old French fustaine, fustaigne (modern French futaine), from Medieval Latin fūstāneum, from (pannus) fūstāneus or (tela) fūstānea, of disputed origin. Sense 3 (“inflated, pompous, or pretentious speech or writing”) is possibly from the fact that the fabric was sometimes used to make cushion- and pillowcases, thus suggesting that the speech or writing is “padded” or “stuffed”; compare bombast. The relationship between sense 4 (“hot drink made of a mixture of alcoholic beverages with egg yolk, lemon, and spices”) and the fabric is unclear. The adjective is from an attributive use of the noun. Cognates * Italian fustagno * Occitan fustani * Portuguese fustão * Spanish fustan

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