brushwood

Etymology

It is formed from English brush + wood.^[2][3][4][5] The first element is the noun meaning undergrowth or lopped branches, not the tool with bristles;^[2][4] it goes back to Anglo-Norman bruce (“brushwood”) and Old French broce (“bush, thicket, undergrowth”).^[4] Johnson wondered whether the compound was a corruption of browsewood.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cut or broken twigs and branches: 1616 in the OED,^[2] about 1613 in Merriam-Webster Unabridged,^[3] and the 1630s in Etymonline.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The word first named wood already cut, and by 1732, in Berkeley's Alciphron, also the living growth of small trees and shrubs.^[2][4] Johnson (1755) gives both, "rough, low, close, shrubby thickets; small wood fit for fire", and quotes Dryden for its use as kindling.^[6]

Timeline

• 1616 – cut or broken twigs and branches.^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged gives about 1613, Etymonline the 1630s.^[3][4]
• 1732 – a thicket of small trees and shrubs, in Berkeley's Alciphron.^[2][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. Small branches and twigs, cut or broken.^[3][2][6]
2. A thicket of shrubs and small trees.^[3][2][6]

Related words

• brush
• wood

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.