"bulwark" - Word of the Day from the OED

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bulwark, n.

SECOND EDITION 1989

(blwk)  Forms: 5 bulwerke, 5-6 bul-, bullwork(e, 6 bolwark, (bulwarge), 6-7 bulwarke, (7 burwarke), 9 bullwark, 6- bulwark. [Cf. Du., MHG. bolwerk, mod.G. bollwerk, Da. bulværk, Sw. bolverk; the word is not recorded in ON., and the Da. and Sw. forms may be of German origin. Prof. Skeat, regarding the word as ultimately Scandinavian, derives it from the words represented in Eng. by BOLE and WORK, in which case the primitive sense would be ‘a work constructed of tree-trunks’. Others would connect the first element with the MHG. verb boln to throw, on the ground that the MHG. word seems in some cases to have meant a machine for throwing large stones. Both etymologies are found in early mod. German authors. The Teut. word was borrowed in French as boullewerc, bollewerc, whence boulever, mod. BOULEVARD.] 

    1. A substantial defensive work of earth, or other material; a rampart, a fortification. Now only arch. or poet.

c1418 Gesta Hen. V (1850) 17 Unum forte fortalitium quod nos ‘barbican’ sui communis ‘bulwerke’ appellamus. 1430 LYDG. Chron. Troy II. xi, Barbycans and also bulworkes huge Afore the towne made for hyghe refuge. 1494 FABYAN VII. 517 Syr John de Pyguygny..wan within the bulwerkys of the same [Amyas]. 1535 COVERDALE Habak. ii. 1 Set me vpon my bulworke, to loke & se what he wolde saye. 1611 BIBLE Deut. xx. 20 Thou shalt build bulwarkes against the city that maketh warre with thee. 1692 BENTLEY Boyle Lect. viii. 294 They have not the Form of a regular Bulwark. 1791 COWPER Odyss. VI. 11 With bulwarks strong their city he enclosed. 1813 SCOTT Trierm. III. iii, Bulwarks and battlement and spire In the red gulf we spy.

    b. A breakwater, mole, sea-wall; an embankment confining the bed of a river. Also fig.

1555 EDEN Decades W. Ind. II. VII. (Arb.) 133 The famous ryuer of Padus..hath the greate mountaynes cauled Alpes..lyinge at the backe therof as it were bulwarges full of moysture. 1586 T. B. La Primaud. Fr. Acad. (1589) 320 Men provide bulwarks and banks against a river that useth to overflow. 1677 PLOT Oxfordsh. 11 At Magdalen College, in the water-walks, near the Bull-work called Dover Peer. 1861 MOTLEY Dutch Rep. II. 271 The Hand-bos, a bulwark formed of oaken piles, was snapped like pack thread. 1865 GEIKIE Scen. & Geol. Scot. iii. 57 To check the further ravages of the waves a stone bulwark was erected.

    2. transf. and fig. A powerful defence or safeguard. Sometimes applied to persons.

1577 HOLINSHED Chron. III. 900/2 The citie and Ile of Rhodes, one of the principall bulworks of christendome. 1614 RALEIGH Hist. World II. 247 Fortescue, that notable Bulwarke of our Lawes. a1674 CLARENDON Hist. Reb. III XIII. 357 To destroy their Fleete: which..are their Walls and Bulwarks. 1718 POPE Iliad VII. 258 He stood, the bulwark of the Grecian band. 1789 BELSHAM Ess. I. xvi. 297 England..appeared..the great bulwark of the common liberties of Europe. 1837-39 HALLAM Hist. Lit. I. v. I. 342 Melanchthon..perceived the necessity of preserving human learning as a bulwark to theology.

    3. The raised woodwork running along the sides of a vessel above the level of the deck. (Not in Bailey, Ash, or Johnson.) Usually pl.

1804 DUNCAN Mariner's Chron. II. 274 The guns on the quarter-deck tearing away the bulwark. 1825 H. GASCOIGNE Nav. Fame 60 Along the side a yellow streak extends Between his Bullwark and the varnish'd Bends. 1840 R. DANA Bef. Mast xxxi. 112 Our ship had uncommonly high bulwarks and rail. 1866 NEALE Seq. & Hymns 36 Dashed upon our labouring bulwarks that fierce wind Euroclydon.

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