| 释义 |
broomstick|ˈbruːmstɪk|
Same as broomstaff. to marry over the broomstick: to go through a quasi-marriage ceremony, in which the parties jump over a broomstick; also called ‘to jump the besom’.
1683tr. Erasmus' Moriæ Enc. 58 Shall take a Broom-stick for a streight-bodied woman. 1711Shaftesbury Charac. (1737) I. 148 A story of a witch upon a broomstick, & a flight in the air. 1732Pope Use of Riches ii. 97 The thriving plants, ignoble broomsticks made. 1824Macaulay Misc. Writ. (1860) I. 95 They were married over a broom-stick. 1841Miall Nonconf. I. 265 Not more hopeless..the attempt to make a broomstick bud. 1881J. Hawthorne Fort. Fool i. iv, ‘There's some as think she was married over the broom-stick, if she was married at all’.
b. comb.
1774Westm. Mag. II. 16 He had no inclination for a Broomstick-marriage. 1807W. Irving Salmag. (1824) 362 The broomstick-whirl'd hags that appear in Macbeth. 1851Mayhew Lond. Labour I. 353, I never had a wife, but I have had two or three broomstick matches, though they never turned out happy. |