bawdry
Americannoun
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Archaic. lewdness; obscenity; bawdiness.
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Obsolete.
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the business of a prostitute.
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illicit intercourse; fornication.
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noun
Etymology
Origin of bawdry
First recorded in 1350–1400, bawdry is from the Middle English word bawdery. See bawd, -ery
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The DAE's weakness in unprinted language may be connected with a reluctance to include unprintable language, for the great U.S. contributions to invective and bawdry are gravely slighted.
From Time Magazine Archive
It's movie analysis with a serrated edge; film criticism as stand-up bawdry; intellectual improvisation that soars into the highest form of word jazz.
From Time Magazine Archive
He can achieve piercing moments of self-revelation, only to resort to vaudevillian bits of bawdry or sink into bathos.
From Time Magazine Archive
Beaten into the mixture of bawdry and cynicism are a couple of bitter speeches of social protest, written in a heavy Teutonic style that even Blitzstein's tart translation could not leaven.
From Time Magazine Archive
Thus, Brooks lumps 1601 with Mark Twain's "bawdry," and interprets it simply as another indication of frustration.
From 1601 Conversation as it was by the Social Fireside in the Time of the Tudors by Mark Twain
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
