bur
noun
a rough, prickly case around the seeds of certain plants, as the chestnut or burdock.
bur
1 American
[bur]
/ bɜr /
noun
-
a rough, prickly case around the seeds of certain plants, as the chestnut or burdock.
-
any bur-bearing plant.
-
something that adheres like a bur.
-
Machinery. burr.
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Dentistry. a rotary cutting tool usually of steel or other hard metal shaped into a shank and a head, for removing carious material from teeth and preparing cavities for filling.
-
Surgery. a cutting tool resembling that of a dentist, used for the excavation of bone.
verb (used with object)
burred,
burring
bur
2
American
[bur]
/ bɜr /
noun
bur.
3
American
abbreviation
Bur.
4
American
abbreviation
Bur.
1
British
abbreviation
BUR
2
British
abbreviation
bur
3
British
/ bɜː /
noun
verb
bur
Scientific
/ bûr /
Etymology
Origin of bur
1300–50; Middle English burre, apparently cognate with Danish burre, Norwegian, Swedish borre bur
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.
See Examples For:
The panel does not have the power to compel Andrew to appear in front of them, bur intends to ask questions related to information on Epstein's network and associates based on their "longstanding" friendship.
From BBC ● Nov. 6, 2025
It was going to be made for television, and somehow, it was unplugged from PBS, bur they already started pre-production, so they decided, we’ll make it as a Merchant Ivory film.
From Salon ● Aug. 30, 2024
Van Pelt repeated the method on 11 more trees, including bur oak, scarlet oak and the pecan.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 1, 2023
Each acorn was painted with colored bands to indicate its species: red oak, bur oak, black oak, white oak, swamp white oak, scarlet oak, pin oak, willow oak.
From New York Times ● Nov. 25, 2022
Surrounded by chollas, bur sage, and the comical scurrying of collared lizards, McCandless pitched his tent in the puny shade of a tamarisk and basked in his newfound freedom.
From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer
June 24, '64; bur. in Poplar Grove Cem., grave 173, sec.
From In The Ranks From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House by R. E. McBride
Chinese Imperial Bur. of Mines, 1899, doing extensive exploration in interior of China.
From The Mirrors of Washington by John Kirby
Holmes, W.H.: three articles on pottery, Rep. of Bur. of Ethnol., 1882-83, p.
From Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 Containing Sixteen Experimental Investigations from the Harvard Psychological Laboratory. by Hugo Münsterberg
The airport project, known as Elevate BUR, has been overseen by the project management company Jacobs.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 8, 2026
Even after the rigors of 9/11 TSA security, BUR still feels like the mini-mart of airports, a place where you can just roll into in your jammies.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 13, 2023
The patter, delivered in Mr. Silven’s smooth, slightly burred voice, is a little pat, as when he intones, “By coincidence, by fate, by destiny, a group of you have come together to predict the improbable.”
From New York Times ● Nov. 24, 2017
Camera shutters burred; the guizers yelled; and the longship, traveling in the opposite direction, scythed through the fire like a ghostly spectre.
From Slate ● Oct. 30, 2015
Mr. Starr has a skinny, burred voice that sounds as if he were quivering, and when the guitarist Paul Jackson chimes in with high harmony vocals, as on “Six Ways to Sunday,” it’s bracing.
From New York Times ● Aug. 13, 2012
Murray & Hillman burred and sputtered to good effect.
From Time Magazine Archive
At d is needed a hollow pivot, fashioned out of a quarter of an inch of pencil-point protector or some other thin tube, burred over slightly at the ends so as not to fall out.
From Things To Make by Archibald Williams
Both tracks feature a sardonic Jagger half-singing, half-spitting his lines in a primitive rap over programmed beats and burring, blues-rock guitar riffs.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 28, 2017
As the dour old sheepherder, whose heart is as black as his dog, Black Wull, cinemaudiences may find squat Actor Will Fyffe's burring phrases difficult to understand, his meaning never.
From Time Magazine Archive
James Garfield devised an adjustment knob and a turn-on switch for his burring roll which have been adopted throughout the plant.
From Time Magazine Archive
James Ramsay MacDonald is never so happy as when burring out sonorous periods on the subject of his great specialty "the Peace of the Wor-r-rld."
From Time Magazine Archive
A clock, with a little wheeze and burring attached to each chime, rang six, and upon it, Mrs. Coblenz, breathing from a climb, opened the door.
From The Best Short Stories of 1917 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story by Edward J. (Edward Joseph Harrington) O'Brien
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.
