musette

American  

[myoo-zet] / mjuˈzɛt /

noun

1. Also called musette bag. a small leather or canvas bag with a shoulder strap, used for carrying personal belongings, food, etc., while hiking, marching, or the like.

2. a French bagpipe of the 17th and early 18th centuries, with several chambers and drones, and with the wind supplied by a bellows rather than a blowpipe.

3. a woodwind instrument similar to but smaller than a shawm.

4. a short musical piece with a drone bass, often forming the middle section of a gavotte.

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musette British  

/ mjuːˈzɛt, myzɛt /

noun

1. a type of bagpipe with a bellows popular in France during the 17th and 18th centuries

2. a dance, with a drone bass originally played by a musette

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Etymology

Origin of musette

First recorded in 1350–1400; musette def. 1 was first recorded in 1920–25; Middle English, from Middle French, equivalent to muse “bagpipe” (derivative of muser “to play the bagpipe,” from Latin mussāre “to hum”) + -ette; see origin at muse, -ette

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

musette

They hurled cotton musette bags, which hold riders’ snacks, into previously pristine rivers.

From New York Times ● Apr. 14, 2021

In addition to his suitcase, musette bag, and walnut cane, MacArthur would take his wife Jean and son Arthur, the two most precious people in his life.

From Salon ● Nov. 11, 2018

Rustic percussion accents added wildness to some dances; the nasal drone of a musette, a French type of bagpipes, colored the pastoral scene.

From New York Times ● Apr. 15, 2016

Fashionable in Castroesque fatigues and shouldering a musette bag, Kinsella drops by helicopter into the rebel stronghold, an ancient island monastery called Muck Abbey.

From Time Magazine Archive

Yossarian put aside the musette bag from which he had begun removing his toilet articles and braced himself suspiciously.

From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller

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