buller

present singular third person bullers · participle present bullering · participle past bullered · past bullered

1. To boil or seethe.

   The still liquid element startled uprears, It bubbled and bullered and roared in his ears, Like thunder that gallows on high.

   1821, James Hogg, Winter Evening Tales: Collected Among the Cottagers in the South of Scotland

   2 more examples

   If this wer a good argument, to prove a man's sins wer not pardoned, because he still finds corruption bullering up in him, then none in the world should have their sin pardoned!

   1842, Robert Wodrow, Analecta: Or Materials for a History of Remarkable Providences Mostly Relating to Scotch Ministers and Christians

   The end of an assay in the Edinburgh mint was described exactly so in 1639: 'in this haill tyme it was always bullering and as it were seithing bot so soone as it settled and rested from so doeing (al the quhich tyme there did appeir some cleir twinkling sparkles into it)' the assayer 'tooke it forthe bot not in ane instant bot softely by retireing and advancing.

   2011, John Craig, The Mint: A History of the London Mint from A.D. 287 to 1948, →ISBN, page 24

plural bullers

1. The bubbling or seething of a torrent.

present singular third person bullers · participle present bullering · participle past bullered · past bullered

1. To make a lot of noise.

   It never shrinked nor feared, but would dowk under the water, snorting and bullering, terrible to the hearers and beholders.

   1828, John Spalding, The History of the Troubles and Memorable Transactions in Scotland and England

   2 more examples

   "Sae we let go the rape,” said David, “ and he went adown the water screeching and bullering like a Bull of Bashan, as he's ca'd in Scripture.”

   1818, Sir Walter Scott, The Heart of Mid-Lothian

   On the other side there lay a lighted suburb, which we thridded for a while, then turned into a dark lane, and presently found ourselves wading in the night among deep sand where we could hear a bullering of the sea.

   1895, Robert Louis Stevenson, David Balfour, page 331

2. To force one's way; to be pushy.

   The door of the vet's banged open and the receptionist bullered out.

   1996, Colophon Press, Madam X. - Issue 1, page 23

   2 more examples

   It was not that he bullered and swore like so many of his farmer neighbours. Their men knew what to expect from them, and they swore back, knowing that the next day they could speak to them as if nothing had happened. But Will Murray was different. His word was law.

   1989, Fred Urquhart, Graeme Roberts, Full Score: Short Stories, page 69

   But it's Christmas the morn's morn — It bullered, throbbed like a U-boat, black.

   2005, John Aberdein, Amande's Bed, →ISBN, page 8

plural bullers

1. A steer that allows itself to be mounted by bulls when in the crowded conditions of a feedlot.

   The annual incidence of buller steers within the feedlot industry is reported to fall between 2 and 4 percent, but the incidence per pen can be quite variable ranging from 0.0 percent to 11.2 percent per pen (Taylor et al., 1997).

   2008, G. John Benson, Bernard E. Rollin, The Well-Being of Farm Animals: Challenges and Solutions, →ISBN, page 200

   2 more examples

   Male cattle ('riders') in intensive housing are prone to mount herdmates willing to stand to be mounted ('bullers'). The buller-steer syndrome has been estimated to cost $70 per head, which can represent significant losses in large feedlots (Blackshaw et al., 1997). Incidence of bullers in a feedlot was about 2% (409 bullers in 20,428 mixed breed steers, Irwin et al., 1979).

   1997, Jack L. Albright, Clive Wendell Arave, The Behaviour of Cattle, page 253

   Buller steers are often injured from persistent mounting by pen mates, or debilitated to the point that they must be removed from the group and housed separately. The added labor and pens required to manage buller steers cuts into profit margins. Losses are even greater when buller steers become debilitated.

   2008, Edward O. Price, Principles and Applications of Domestic Animal Behavior, →ISBN

2. CaribbeanJamaicaderogatoryA homosexual man.

   “Well, day say yuh must be ah buller man,” the pastor said flatly.

   2012, G. Modele Dale Clarke, Up in Mahaica: Stories From the Market People, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   My mother always mentioned these teachings when she saw a buller man or heard about someone thought to be a buller.

   2004, Rhoda Reddock, Interrogating Caribbean Masculinities, →ISBN

   This process of articulating my own story and asking other bullers to make public their stories is an attempt to assert and broaden the reality of Black male same-sex existence, which too many people for far too long have tried to erase.

   2004, Wesley Eddison Aylesworth Crichlow, Buller Men and Batty Bwoys: Hidden Men in Toronto and Halifax Black Communities, →ISBN

plural Bullers

1. countableuncountableA surname from Middle English.
2. countableuncountableA river and gorge on the West Coast, New Zealand.
3. countableuncountableA territorial authority of the West Coast, New Zealand; in full, Buller District.

1. datedOxford University slangThe Bullingdon Club.

   1 more example

   Writing in Radio Times, Michael Cockerell, the veteran political film-maker, reveals that the documentary includes a scene in which Johnson examines a famous photograph of himself, Cameron and other members of the “Buller” in their blue tailcoats with white silk facings, mustard waistcoats and gold buttons.

   2013 March 19, Adam Sherwin, “‘Toffishness and twittishness’—Boris Johnson spills beans on Bullingdon Club and reveals childhood ambition to be ‘world king’”, in The Independent

plural Bullers

1. datedOxford University slangA member of the Bullingdon Club.

   Osborne is said to have been ragged by fellow Bullers over having attended St Paul's, the top London day school, which is, apparently, not posh enough.

   2008 May 8, Barney Ronay, “Young, rich and drunk”, in The Guardian, →ISSN