Definition
nounA lightweight container, generally round, open at the top, and tapering toward the bottom.
nounA lightweight woven container, generally round, open at the top, and tapering toward the bottom.
Sentence Examples
Mary set the basket on the table.
Quite a lot of rotten apples were in the basket.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree
Proto-Celtic *baskis
Proto-Brythonicder.
Late Latin bascauda
Anglo-Norman bascatbor.
Middle English basket
English basket
From Middle English basket, from Anglo-Norman baschet, basket, bascat, of obscure origin. Displaced native Old English mand.
One theory is that it derives from Late Latin bascauda (“kettle, table-vessel”), from Proto-Brythonic (in Breton baskodenn), from Proto-Celtic *baskis (“bundle, load”), from purported Proto-Indo-European *bʰask- (“bundle”), but this is now widely viewed as a substrate word for phonetic reasons. Related to Latin fascis (“bundle, package, load”) (whence English fasces), Albanian bokshe (“bundle”), Breton bac'h (“bundle, load”), Ancient Greek φάκελος (phákelos) and βάσκιοι (báskioi) (“bundle (of sticks)”); see also faggot (“(originally) bundle of sticks”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"The earliest Wabanaki baskets were strong and bulky; practical tools for everyday life."
— 2026 May 26, Hannah Martin, “Fancy Baskets”, in Architectural Digest, volume 83, number 4, page 97:
"In my time, the follies of the town crept slowly among us, but now they travel faster than a stage-coach. Its fopperies come down not only as inside passengers, but in the very basket."
— 1773, Oliver Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer:
"Baw! damme, but I'll fight you both, one after the other——with baskets."
— 1773, Oliver Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer:
"Like most human activities, ballooning has sponsored heroes and hucksters and a good deal in between. For every dedicated scientist patiently recording atmospheric pressure and wind speed while shivering at high altitudes, there is a carnival barker with a bevy of pretty girls willing to dangle from a basket or parachute down to earth."
— 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36:
"Thus the capital of the Corinthian column always resembles a deep narrow basket covered with a tile, and completely surrounded by foliage"
— 1832, Edward Hall, Civil Architecture: