Buttload - Wiktionary

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• 1 English Toggle English subsection
  • 1.1 Alternative forms
  • 1.2 Etymology
  • 1.3 Pronunciation
  • 1.4 Noun
  • 1.5 See also

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• Discussion

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In other projects Appearance move to sidebar hide From Wiktionary, the free dictionary See also: butt load and butt-load

English

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Alternative forms

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• butt-load, butt load

Etymology

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From butt +‎ load. Butt in this context may be possibly one or both of:

• butt (“large wooden cask”) (Etymology 3)
• butt (“two-wheeled cart”) (Etymology 5)

Alternatively, the term may either be a corruption of English boatload or have been influenced by that term (except for the specific, West Country dialect sense).

All senses above also synchronically reanalyzed as buttocksful.

Pronunciation

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• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

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buttload (plural buttloads)

1. (obsolete, UK, West Country) A regional English measure of capacity of a heavy cart (a butt), containing 6 seams, or 48 bushels, equivalent to 384 gallons. Synonym: buttful Coordinate terms: cartload, cartful, wagonload, wagonful, drayload, drayful, sledgeload, sledgeful, boatload, boatful, assload (amount carried on donkeyback)
   • 1796, William Marshall, “Provincialisms of West Devonshire”, in The Rural Economy of the West of England‎[1], volume 1, page 324:BUTT LOAD: about six seams.
   • 1819, Abraham Rees, The Cyclopaedia‎[2], volume 31, Salting:The farmers near the fishing towns in the same district [Cornwall] likewise buy the refuse of bruised and small pilchards, which are rejected as unfit for curing or the market, and are called caff, four cart-loads of twelve bushels each being considered as the quantity proper for an acre. […] The butt-load formerly cost about 9s. or 10s. but they now fetch 15s. or 20s. the load.
   • 1839 July, Richard Edmonds, “A Statistical Account of the Parish of Madron, containing the Borough of Penzance, in Cornwall”, in Quarterly Journal of the Statistical Society of London‎[3], volume 2, page 211:The different kinds of manure usually employed in this neighbourhood are sea-weed, sand, stable-dung, ashes, and fish-dung. The quantities vary so much according to the condition of the land and other circumstances that it is impossible to state with any degree of accuracy what quantity is applied to the acre. In one of the conditions of leases previously quoted, it is stipulated that 10 butt-loads of good town or fish dung, and 10 butt-loads of sea-sand (to be mixed with the necessary quantity of earth) shall be carried for every acre broken up for tillage.
2. (dated, British, Southern US, New England) A large amount carried in a butt. We spent all day Sunday and picked up a buttload of pecans.
3. (by extension, mildly vulgar, slang) Any large but unspecific amount. Synonyms: assload, shitload, boatload, cartload, shedload; see also Thesaurus:lot
   • 1999, Philip Greenspun, Philip and Alex's Guide to Web Publishing, page 267:You can collect a metric buttload of data about user activity on your site without too much effort.
   • 2004, Theresa Alan, Spur of the Moment, page 264:Anyway, they are paying me a buttload of money to do this series, and I want to share my good fortune with you and that's that.
   • 2005, Napoleon Dynamite: The Complete Quote Book, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 67:"Yeah, there's, like, a buttload of gangs at this school."

See also

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• tun (of wine or beer, contains two butts)
• pipe (of wine or beer, is 126 gallons or one butt)
• hogshead (of wine or beer, one-half butt)
• barrel (of wine or beer, one-quarter butt)
• ton
• cask
• keg

Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=buttload&oldid=88793811" Categories:

• English compound terms
• English terms with audio pronunciation
• English lemmas
• English nouns
• English countable nouns
• English terms with obsolete senses
• British English
• West Country English
• English terms with quotations
• English dated terms
• Southern US English
• New England English
• English terms with usage examples
• English vulgarities
• English slang
• en:Units of measure

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