Etymology Inherited from Middle English bugle, from Anglo-Norman bugle (“young ox, heifer; bugle”), from Latin būculus (“young ox, steer”).
1
A horn used by hunters.
2
Entertainment, Lifestyle, Music A simple brass instrument consisting of a horn with no valves, playing only pitches in its harmonic series
3
The sound of something that bugles.
the bugle of an elk
4
A sort of wild ox; a buffalo.
Then tooke that squire an horne of bugle small, Which hong adowne his side in twisted gold And tassels gay.1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faery Queene, page 88:
The tongue so rough, that were it licks, it fetches blood. The Greeks used not these, nor Bugles in Physick, not having tried their vertue; though Indian-woods are full of such, yet parts of them are of more efficacy in medicine, (it is thought) than any part of ordinary Oxen.1678, Joannes Jonstonus (M.D., Polonus.), A Description of the Nature of Four-Footed Beasts, page 31:
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All in the merry strand, With the ran, ran tan, And the tippy, tippy tran, And away with the royal bow! wow! wow! And the riddle diddle do, And the bugle's horn, For into the woods we'll run, brave boys, And into the woods we'll run.1928, Lora Sarah La Mance, The House of Waltman and Its Allied Families, page 17:
a hunting horn, origin. made of the horn of a "bugle" or wild ox1992, William Shakespeare, Holger Klein, Much Ado about Nothing: A New Critical Edition, page 145:
Etymology Inherited from Middle English bugle, from Anglo-Norman bugle (“young ox, heifer; bugle”), from Latin būculus (“young ox, steer”).
1
To announce, sing, or cry in the manner of a musical bugle.
“It was as though the very constellations knew our impending sorrow,” he bugled, his head raised to the ceiling, his voice full-throated.1952, Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man, Penguin Books (2014), page 128:
Bugle eyeballs.c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene v]:
bugle
noun
Etymology From Late Latin bugulus (“a woman's ornament”), probably from Latin būculus.
1
Fashion, Lifestyle A tubular glass or plastic bead sewn onto clothes as a decorative trim
How well so ever I fancied my lectures against pride had conquered the vanity of my daughters; yet I still found them secretly attached to all their former finery: they still loved laces, ribbands, bugles and catgut […]1766, [Oliver Goldsmith], chapter 4, in The Vicar of Wakefield: […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), Salisbury, Wiltshire: […] B. Collins, for F[rancis] Newbery, […], →OCLC:
With the exception of a woman in a black silk dress with bugles who, incredible as it may seem, had ordered cocoa and sparkling limado simultaneously and was washing down a meal of Cambridge sausages and pastry with alternate draughts of both liquids, the place was empty.1925, P. G. Wodehouse, chapter 20, in Sam the Sudden:
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Billionaires wear hoodies and sneakers, not taffeta and bugle beads.2026 January 20, Vanessa Friedman, “The Way ‘Rich’ Once Looked”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC:
bugle
noun
Etymology From Middle English bugle (“bugleweed”), from Anglo-Norman and Old French bugle, from Medieval Latin bugilla, probably related to Late Latin bugillo.
1
A plant in the family Lamiaceae grown as a ground cover Ajuga reptans, and other plants in the genus Ajuga.
Derived terms
bitter bugle, blue bugle), bugleweed, carpet bugle, common bugle, creeping bugle, erect bugle, pyramid bugle, upright bugle), water bugle, yellow bugle