English
broom
see also: Broom
Pronunciation
  • enPR bro͞om, IPA: /bɹuːm/, /bɹʊm/
Noun

broom

  1. (countable) A domestic utensil with fibers bound together at the end of a long handle, used for sweeping.
  2. (countable, curling) An implement with which players sweep the ice to make a stone travel further and curl less; a sweeper.
  3. Any of several yellow-flowered shrubs of the family Fabaceae, in the tribe Genisteae, including genera Cytisus, Genista, and Spartium, with long, thin branches and small or few leaves.
    • 1610, The Tempest, by William Shakespeare, act 4 scene 1:
      […] and thy broom groves,
      Whose shadow the dismissed bachelor loves,
      Being lass-lorn […]
Synonyms Translations Translations Translations Verb

broom (brooms, present participle brooming; past and past participle broomed)

  1. (transitive, intransitive) To sweep with a broom.
    • 1855 September 29, Charles Dickens, "Model Officials", in Household Words: A Weekly Journal, Bradbury and Evens (1856), [http://books.google.com/books?id=uuLwE4HLjvgC&pg=PA206&dq=brooming page 206]:
      “ […] Sidi, I was busy in the exercise of my functions, occupied in brooming the front of the stables, when who should come but Hhamed Ould Denéï on horseback, at full gallop, as if he were going to break his neck. […] ”
    • ante 1857 William Makepeace Thackeray, Our Street, in Christmas Books: Mrs. Perkins's Ball, Our Street, Dr. Birch, Chapman & Hall (1857), [http://books.google.com/books?id=hB8GAAAAQAAJ&pg=RA1-PA8&dq=brooming Our Street page 8]:
      It was but this morning at eight, when poor Molly, was brooming the steps, and the baker paying her by no means unmerited compliments, that my landlady came whirling out of the ground-floor front, and sent the poor girl whimpering into the kitchen.
    • ante 1920 Opal Stanley Whiteley, The Story of Opal: The Journal of an Understanding Heart, Atlantic Monthly Press (1920), [http://books.google.com/books?id=l0gLAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA59&dq=broomed pages 58–59]:
      After that I did take the broom from its place, and I gave the floor a good brooming. I broomed the boards up and down and cross-ways. There was not a speck of dirt on them left.
    • 1997, Will Hobbs, Far North (HarperCollins, ISBN 0380725363, page 100:
      We broomed the dirt floor clean with spruce branches, brought our gear inside, and moved in.
  2. (roofing) To improve the embedding of a membrane by using a broom or squeegee to smooth it out and ensure contact with the adhesive under the membrane.
Translations Verb

broom (brooms, present participle brooming; past and past participle broomed)

  1. (nautical) Alternative form of bream to clean a ship's bottom
Broom
Proper noun
  1. A village in Bedfordshire, England.
  2. A village in Warwickshire, England.
  3. Surname


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