sb. Obs. Forms: 3–5 boist(e, 4–7 boyste. Also 3 buste, 5 bust; 4, 6 bost, 6–7 boost(e; 4 bouste; 5 buist, buyste, 9 Sc. buist. See BOOST, BUIST, BUST. [ME. boiste, a. OF. boiste ‘box,’ in Pr. bostia, repr., through late L. bossida, boxida, buxida, L. pyxida, a. Gr. πυξίδα, acc. of πυξίς box (Brachet). The phonetic history of the variant forms in Eng. and Sc. is obscure: but uy is prob. an early variant of oi, and the forms in o, u, seem due to simplification of the diphthong, as in 16th c. Sc. jone = join, etc.]
1. A box, a casket; chiefly used of a box for ointment, a vase or flask for oil, etc. (= BOX sb.2 1.)
a. 1225. Ancr. R., 226. He haueð so monie bustes [v.r. boistes] ful of his letuaries.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 14003 (Gött.). A boist of smerles has scho nomin.
1362. Langl., P. Pl., A. XII. 68. I haue a gret boyste At my bak, of broke bred þi bely for to fylle.
c. 1375. ? Barbour, St. Nicolaus, 294. Scho has brocht A boyst of oyle.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 883. He anoyntide hym anon with his noble boyste.
c. 1450. Lonelich, Grail, xvii. 131. The awngel took a boist with oynement anon.
1633. Treas. Hid. Secrets, cxv. Also of the wood of Rosemarie, make a boyst to smell thereto.
b. Bleeding-boist: a cupping-glass.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 38. Bledynge boyste, ventosa, guna.
2. Dialectal name for a rude hut. [? same word.]
1840. Times, 24 April, 3/6. Along the [London and Brighton] line [of Railway] there have been erected a great number of rude huts or cabins…. For the use of these places to sleep in the workmen pay, each 1s. or 1s. 6d. a-week—two, and not unfrequently three, of them sleeping together in these ‘boists.’
