Also 4 boosen, 5 bos, boce, 5–6 booce. [f. BOSS sb.1]
† 1. trans. To make to project, to stuff out. Obs.
c. 1380. Wyclif, Sel. Wks., III. 124. Soche men þat boosen hor brestis.
† b. intr. To swell out, project. Obs.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 3022. The here of hir hede, huyt as the gold, Bost out vppon brede bright on to loke.
c. 1449. Pecock, Repr., II. ii. 138. Ymagis boocing and seemyng as thouȝ thei were going and passing out of the wal.
1540. Raynold, Byrth Mankynde, I. vii. (1634), 29. The middle part of the wombe port … where it bosseth downeward … hangeth pendant wise.
1542. Udall, Erasm. Apophth., 235 a. With a great bunche, which, bossyng out, made him crookebacked.
2. trans. To fashion in relief; to beat or press out into a raised ornament, to emboss.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 1564. Ymagry ouer all amyt þere was … Bost out of þe best þe byg toures vmbe.
1530. Palsgr., 459/1. I booce or to boce out, as workemen do a holowe thynge.
1881. Porcelain Wks. Worcester, 21. The workman … bosses it [the clay] with a wet sponge, and presses it into every line of the pattern.
3. To furnish or ornament with bosses.
c. 1626. Dick of Devon., III. ii. in Bullen, O. Pl. (1883), II. 46. But was ever English horse thus Spanish bitted and bossd!
1650. Fuller, Pisgah, IV. vi. 112. Either only studded or bossed therewith.
1664. Pepys, Diary (1879), III. 5. Thence to the clasp-makers to have it [my Chaucer] clasped and bossed.
1849. Ruskin, Sev. Lamps, i. x. 20. Do not let us boss our roofs with wretched half-worked blunt-edged rosettes.
fig. 1583. Stubbes, Anat. Abus., II. 50. Then shall your mouth be bossed with the lather.
