Photo composite of two sides of a strip of buckram used in bookbinding
15 July 2026
Buckram is cotton or linen that has been stiffened, similar to canvas. But that original meaning has expanded into a figurative use meaning a stiff or starchy disposition or a false appearance of strength or courage. The word is a borrowing from either the Anglo-Norman bokeram or from Italian. Ultimately, the word is from the name of the city of Bukhara in present-day Uzbekistan, which was the source of and a trading center for textiles in the medieval period.
Buckram first appears in English in the early thirteenth century with a meaning of fine linen or cotton fabric. We see it in an ecclesiastical inventory from the year 1222. The text is primarily Latin, but the English word appears in its midst:
ALBÆ viii. de serico; item, alba una de bukeram, cum parura, brodata; et alia alba linea, cum parura, brodata cum leonibus, de dono R. de Bellafago, et una alba linea cum parura de tribus aurifris[um], quæ pervenit de dono Stephani Ridel.
(ALBS eight of silk; likewise, one white of buckram, with a parure, embroidered; and another white linen, with a parure, embroidered with lions, from the gift of R. de Bellafago, and one white linen with a parure of three gold friezes, which came from the gift of Stephen Ridel.)
The sense of a cloth stiffened with gum or paste is in place by the early fifteenth century. From the 1436 political poem The Libel of English Policy, which has a section describing trade:
Now bere and bacon bene fro Pruse ibroughte
Into Fflandres, as loved and fere isoughte;
Osmonde, coppre, bow-staffes, stile, and wex,
Peltre-ware, and grey, pych, terre, borde, and flex,
And Coleyne threde, fustiane, and canvase,
Carde, bokeram, of olde tyme thus it was.
(Now barley and bacon are brought from Prussia into Flanders, sought from afar and dear in price; osmond, copper, bow staffs, steel, and wax, pelts, and gray fur, pitch, tar, lumber, and flax. And Cologne thread, fustian, and canvas, muslin, buckram, in past times, thus it was.)
And the figurative sense of buckram applied to persons, meaning starchy, stuck up, or giving a false appearance of strength appears in the latter half of the sixteenth century. From an anti-Catholic treatise written by William Fulke in 1577:
And how is the Popish church able to gather general Councells at this daye? who will come at her calling? Except a few Spaniardes, and a ioly company of buckram bishops of Italie?
Shakespeare would play on the literal and figurative meanings of buckram in Henry IV, Part 1, published in 1598. The following passage is a conversation between Prince Hal (later King Henry V) and Falstaff:
Prin[ce]. What, fought you with them all?
Falst[aff]. Al, I know not what you cal al, but if I fought not with fiftie of them I am a bunch of radish: if there were not two or three and fiftie vpon poore olde Iacke, then am I no two legd Creature.
Prin. Pray God you haue not murdred some of them.
Falst. Nay, thats past praying for, I haue pepperd two of them. Two I am sure I haue paied, two rogues in buckrom sutes: I tel thee what Hall, if I tell thee a lie, spit in my face; call me horse, thou knowest my olde warde: here I lay, and thus I bore my poynt, foure rogues in Buckrom let driue at me.
Prin[.] What foure? thou saidst but two euen now.
Falst. Foure Hal, I told thee foure.
Sources:
Anglo-Norman Dictionary, AND2 Phase 1, 2000–06, s.v. bokeram, n.
Fulke, William. “An Overthrow and Confvtation of the Popish Churches Doctrine, Touching Purgatory, and Prayers for the Dead” (alt. title: “Against Allen”). Two Treatises Written Against the Papistes. London: Thomas Vautrollier, 1577, 98. ProQuest: Early English Books Online.
Jones, W. H. Rich. “The Register of S. Osmund” (1222). Vetus Registrum Sarisberiense (alt. title, Registrum S. Osmundi Episcopi), vol. 2. London: Stationary Office, 1884, 132. Kraus Reprint, 1965. HathiTrust Digital Library.
“The Libel of English Policy” (1436). Political Poems and Songs, vol. 2. Thomas Wright, ed. London: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, 1861, 157–205 at 171. HathiTrust Digital Library.
Merriam-Webster.com, accessed 25 June 2026, s.v. buckram, n.
Middle English Dictionary, 17 June 2026, s.v. bokeram, n.
Oxford English Dictionary Online, 1888, s.v. buckram, n.
Shakespeare, William. The Historie of Henrie IV (Part 1). London: Peter Short for Andrew Wise, 1598, sig. D4r. ProQuest: Early English Books Online. (Act 2, Scene 4, lines 192–207 in modern editions).
Photo credit: Grendelkhan, 2004. Wikimedia Commons. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
