Forms: 1–2 béan, 3–6 ben, 4–6 bene, been(e, (Sc. and north. bein, beyn), 6–7 beane, 6– bean. Pl. beans; in 1 béana, 4 bene, benen, 4–6 benes, -ys. [Common Teut.: OE. béan (fem.) = OHG. bôna, mod.G. bohne, MDu. bone, Du. boon, ON. baun:—OTeut. *baunâ (str. fem.); conjectured by Fick to be for an earlier babna, cogn. with L. faba, Slav. bobŭ, Old Prussian babo; but phonetic considerations render this doubtful.]
1. A smooth, kidney-shaped, laterally flattened seed, borne in long pods by a leguminous plant, Faba vulgaris.
The garden variety, or Broad-bean, is used, in its green state, as a culinary vegetable, esp. in Britain by the poorer classes, as in the proverbial ‘beans and bacon’; Field- and Horse-beans, when ripened to a brownish-black color, are used as food for horses and cattle, and have also been made into bean-meal, used for coarse bread.
c. 1000. Sax. Leechd., II. 84. Genim bean mela.
c. 1325. Coer de L., 6004. Whete & ooten, pesen and bene.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. VI. 184. Lete hem ete … benes and bren ybaken togideres.
c. 1394. P. Pl. Crede, 762. A great bolle-full of benen were betere in his wombe.
1475. Bk. Noblesse, 69. Benys, pesyn, and aveyn for horsmete.
1551. Turner, Herbal, I. 178. Beanes … are harde of digestion, and make troblesum dreames.
1620. Venner, Via Recta, i. 17. Bread made of Beanes is very drie.
1707. Lond. Gaz., No. 4357/4. At Ham … are to be sold, Garden Beans, Gosport-Beans.
1832. Veg. Subst. Food, 218. In Barbary … stewed with oil and garlic, beans form … the principal food of persons of all classes.
2. The cultivated plant that bears this seed; it has fragrant violet-tinted white flowers, whence the often-mentioned ‘fragrance of the bean-fields.’
940. Chart. Eadmund, in Cod. Dipl., V. 265. Of þistelleaʓe to beanleaʓe.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XVII. lxiv. Benes [ed. 1495 beenys] bereþ white floures.
1611. Cotgr., s.v. Febve, In Cuckoe-time when Beanes doe flower.
1728. Thomson, Spring (R.). Where the breeze blows from yon extended field Of blossom’d beans.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. I. viii. 51. It will grow verily, like the Boy’s Bean, in the Fairy-Tale, heaven-high.
3. The plant and seed of the allied genus Phaseolus, of which the best-known species are the French, Kidney, or Haricot Bean (P. vulgaris), and Scarlet Runner (P. multiflorus). The unripe pods of both, and the ripe seeds of the former, are used as culinary vegetables.
(Navy Bean: the dried haricot. Pea Bean: a small variety of it.)
1548. Turner, Names of Herbs (1881), 75. Kydney beanes … or arber beanes, because they serue to couer an arber for the tyme of Summer. Ibid. (1562), Herbal, II. 140 b. The vertues of Kidney beanes. The fruyt is sodden wyth the sede, and it is eaten after the maner of a wurt or eatable herbe, as sperage is eaten.
1632. Sherwood, s.v. Bean, French, or Romane Beanes.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. V. ix. 302. She who has quietly shelled French-beans for her dinner.
4. Name given to the seeds of other plants, usually from some resemblance in shape to the common bean; e.g., Egyptian or Pythagorean Bean, the seed of the Lotus (Nelumbium speciosum); Bean of Molucca, seed of Guilandina Bonducella; Bean of St. Ignatius, seed of Strychnos amara; Tonka Bean, the perfumed seed of Dipterix odorata; so too coffee bean, etc. See also BUCK-, LOCUST-BEAN.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XVII. lxiv. (1495), 641. Beenys growe in Egypte … wyth a heed as a Popye and therin beenes ben closid: and that heed is red as a Rose.
1484. Caxton, Curiall, 6. The benes of Pictagoras … gafe better sauour.
1551. Turner, Herbal, I. 123. The beane of Egipt is … astryngent.
1611. Cotgr., Anacarde, th’ East Indian fruit called Anacardium, or Beane of Malaca.
1830. Lindley, Nat. Syst. Bot., 215. The St. Ignatius’s bean … is prescribed by the native practitioners of India in cholera.
c. 1865. Circ. Sc., I. 351/1. The organic acids … of the coffee-beans.
5. Any object resembling a bean in shape.
1561. Hollybush, Hom. Apoth., 38 b. Take the beanes or hinderfallinges of Goates.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 215. The dryed beans of a Cutle fish.
1881. Raymond, Mining Gloss., Beans (Newcastle), small coals.
6. Literary and proverbial uses:—
a. in reference to a bean’s small value; cf. straw.
1297. R. Glouc., 497. Al nas wurth a bene.
c. 1325. Poem temp. Edw. II., xlvii. No rich man … dredeth God The worth of a bean.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. III. 147 (Wright). To be corsed in consistorie She counted noght a bene [v.r. russhe].
1413. Lydg., Pylgr. Sowle, I. xv. (1483), 9. Al my wyt auayleth nought a bene.
1548. Hall, Chron. (1809), 690. Thei set not by the Frenche Kyng one bene.
1656. Hobbes, Liberty, etc. (1841), 426. But all this will not advantage his cause the black of a bean.
b. in reference to the former use of beans in balloting.
1580. North, Plutarch (1670), 272. He was one year Mayor, or Provost of Athens … He came to it by drawing of the Bean.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 15. Abstaine from beanes, i.e. Intermeddle not in the affaires of State.
1660. Milton, Free Commw., Wks. 1851, 438. To convey each Man his bean or ballot into the Box.
c. in reference to the custom of appointing as King of the company on Twelfth-night, the man in whose portion of the cake the bean was found. [Lauder’s reference appears to be to this, though he seems to have confounded the 16th c. Eng. bean (bēn) with his own Sc. bane ‘bone.’]
1556. Lauder, Tractate (1864), 29. Thir kyngs þai ar bot kyngs of bane; And schort wyl heir þare tyme be gane.
1592. Sp. at Sudely, 8, in Nichols, Progr. Q. Eliz., II. Cut the cake: who hath the beane shall be kinge; and where the peaze is she shall be quene.
1648. Herrick, Hesper., 376 (N.). Beane’s the king of the sport.
1853. Soyer, Pantroph., 55. The cake was often full of raisins among which one bean and one pea were introduced.
d. in proverbial expressions.
1562. J. Heywood, Prov. & Epigr. (1867), 24. Hunger makth hard beanes sweete. Ibid., 56. Alwaie the bygger eateth the beane.
1568. Marr. Wit & Wisd., 45 (N.). It is not for idlenis that men sowe beanes in the wind [i.e., labor in vain].
a. 1624. Bp. M. Smith, Serm. (1632), 178. Euery Beane hath his blacke.
1830. Galt, Laurie T. (1849), II. I. 42. Few men who better knew how many blue beans it takes to make five.
II. Attrib. and Comb.
7. General relations: a. objective with agent-noun or vbl. sb., as bean-setter, -setting; b. instrumental, as bean-election, -fed (1589); c. similative, as bean-ore, -shaped; d. attrib. (of the seed), as bean-bread, -broth, -corn, -diet, -flour, -meal (a 1000), -water; (of the plant), as bean-cod (a 1000), -field, -flower, -haulm, -honey, -husk, -plant, -plot, -rick, -season, -stack, -stubble, -weevil, -wood.
c. 1380. Wyclif, Wks. (1880), 61. Þei myȝtten vnneþe before haue *bene-bred & watir or feble ale.
1701. J. Cunningham, in Phil. Trans., XXIII. 1207. *Bean, or Mandarin Broth … made of the Seed of Sesamum.
c. 1420. Pallad. on Husb., IV. 110. Two basketfull of *bene chaf.
1820. T. Mitchell, Aristoph., I. 161. One much giv’n To a *bean-diet.
1820. Edin. Rev., XXXIV. 303. The folly of the *bean-election.
1589. R. Harvey, Pl. Perc. (1860), 34. Forehorse of my *beane-fed Teeme.
1870. Morris, Earthly Par., I. II. 454. Thy soft breezes blow Sweet with the scent of *beanfields far away.
1610. Healey, St. Aug. City of God, 164. Brutus … kept her feast … with *beane-flowre, and bacon.
a. 1661. Holyday, Juvenal (1673), 25. The distilled water of *bean-flowers.
c. 1000. Sax. Leechd., II. 84. Genim Bean mela.
1847. Gard. Chron., 144. The fitness of *Bean-meal for cheap bread.
1677. Yarranton, Engl. Improv., 18. His Creditors crowd to him as Pigs do … to a *Bean and Peas Rick.
1824. Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. I. (1863), 25. Troops of stooping *bean-setters. Ibid., 26. What work *bean-setting is!
1836–9. Todd, Cycl. Anat. & Phys., II. 530/2. A kidney or *bean-shaped hole called foramen ovale.
1856. Kane, Arct. Expl., II. xvi. 169. A stock of concentrated *bean-soup was cooked.
1824. Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. III. (1863), 91. The obstinate bird ran away behind a *bean-stack.
1585. Jas. I., Ess. Poesie, 68. Some bucklit on a *benvvod, and some on a bene.
8. Special combinations: bean-belly, a great eater of beans, a nickname of dwellers in Leicestershire; bean-brush, the stubble of beans; bean-butter, a dish made from unshelled beans; bean-caper, English name of the genus Zygophyllum, South African plants with fleshy leaves and flower-buds used as capers; † bean-cod, a bean-pod; also applied to a kind of river boat in use in Portugal; bean-crake, local name of the Corn-crake; bean-dolphin, the aphis or plant-louse of the bean; bean-fly, a beautiful insect, of pale purple color, found on beans; bean-hull (Sc. hool), a bean-pod; bean-mouse, name given to the Long-tailed Field-mouse; bean-pole, -stick, (-wood, obs.), one used for beans to twine round, fig. a lanky fellow; bean-shatter, ? bird-scarer; bean-shot copper, that obtained in rounded grains, by pouring it, when melted, into hot water; beanstalk, the stem of the bean-plant: so called in the fairy-tale of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’; bean-straw, the dried stems of the bean-plant; bean-vine, common name of Phaseolus diversifolius. See also BEAN-FEAST, -GOOSE, -TREE, -TREFOIL.
1659. E. Leigh, Eng. Descr., 114. Leicestershire … yeeldeth great abundance of Peas and Beans … insomuch that there is an old by-word … Leicestershire *Bean-Belly.
1677. Plot, Oxfordsh., 240. Ploughing in the *bean-brush at All-Saints.
1552. Huloet, *Beane butter, conchis.
1597. Gerard, Herball, II. cccxxxii. 827. Called after the Latine *Beane Caper.
c. 1000. Ags. Gosp., Luke xv. 16. His wambe ʓefyllan of þam bean-coddum [v.r. bien-coddun; Lindisf. G. bean-bælʓum; Hatton G. bean-coddan].
1615. Markham, Eng. Housew., II. ii. (1668), 52. A good simple Sallet is Camphire, *Bean cods, Sparagus, and Cucumbers.
1769. Falconer, Dict. Marine (1789), *Bean-cod, a small fishing-vessel … extremely sharp forward, having its stem bent inward above into a great curve.
1647. R. Stapylton, Juvenal, 259. Give me a *beane-hull.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., xviii. He shall hide himself in a *bean-hool if he remains on Scottish ground without my finding him.
1766. Pennant, Zool. (1768), I. 103. They are called *bean-mice from the havoke they make among beans when first sown.
1837. Haliburton, Clockm. (1862), 137. Mr. Jehiel, a *bean-pole of a lawyer.
1632. Chapman & Shirley, Ball, IV. i. To fright away crows, and keep the corn, *beanshatter.
c. 1800[?]. (title) The Surprising History of Jack and the Bean Stalk.
1871. M. Collins, Mrq. & Merch., I. i. 24. Jack’s *beanstalk was nothing to it.
1823. J. Badcock, Dom. Amusem., 54. Thrust *bean-stick into the ground.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Merch. T., 178. [A] woman thirty yere of age … is but *bene-straw.
1838. Hawthorne, Amer. Note Bks. (1871), I. 127. Bean-vines running up round the doors.
