purse

From Middle English purse, from Old English purs (“purse”), partly from pusa (“wallet, bag, scrip”) and partly from burse (“pouch, bag”).

Old English pusa comes from Proto-West Germanic *pusō, from Proto-Germanic *pusô (“bag, sack, scrip”), from Proto-Indo-European *būs- (“to swell, stuff”), and is cognate with Old High German pfoso (“pouch, purse”), Low German pūse (“purse, bag”), Old Norse posi (“purse, bag”), Danish pose (“purse, bag”), Dutch beurs (“purse, bag”). Old English burse comes from Medieval Latin bursa (“leather bag”) (compare English bursar), from Ancient Greek βύρσα (búrsa, “hide, wine-skin”).

Compare also Old French borse (French bourse), Old Saxon bursa (“bag”), Old High German burissa (“wallet”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /pɜːs/
• (US) IPA^(key): /pɝs/

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• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)s
• Homophone: perse

A coin purse

purse (plural purses)

1. A small bag for carrying money.
   • 1550, Steuen Mierdman, The market or fayre of usurers:

     And then muſt many a man occupie as farre as his purſe would reache, and ſtretche out his legges accordynge to the length of his couerlet.

2. (US) A handbag (small bag usually used by women for carrying various small personal items)
3. A quantity of money given for a particular purpose.
   • 1922 February, James Joyce, “[[Episode 12: The Cyclops]]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

     It was a historic and a hefty battle when Myler and Percy were scheduled to don the gloves for the purse of fifty sovereigns.

4. (historical) A specific sum of money in certain countries: formerly 500 piastres in Turkey or 50 tomans in Persia.

• (small bag for carrying money): pocketbook; coin purse, change purse (especially US)
• (small bag used by women): handbag (especially UK)
• (quantity of money): bursary, grant

• bursa, bursar, bursary
• reimburse

• wallet

purse (third-person singular simple present purses, present participle pursing, simple past and past participle pursed)

Two people with pursed lips

1. (transitive) To press (one's lips) in and together so that they protrude.
   • 1901, Matilde Serao, The Land of Cockayne, translator not credited, London: Heinemann, Chapter IV, p. 72,

     The serving Sister pursed up her lips to remind him of the cloistral rule, almost as if she wanted to prevent any conversation between him and the nun.

   • 1916, Leonid Andreyev, "An Original" in The Little Angel and Other Stories, translated by W. H. Lowe, New York: Alfred Knopf, p. 85,

     Anton Ivanovich pursed up his lower lip so that his grey moustache pressed against the tip of his red pitted nose, took in all the officials with his rounded eyes, and after an unavoidable pause emitted a fat unctuous laugh.

   • 1979, Monty Python, Always Look on the Bright Side of Life:

     When you're feeling in the dumps
     Don't be silly chumps
     Just purse your lips and whistle – that's the thing.

   • 2002, R.M.W. Dixon, chapter 9, in Australian Languages: Their Nature and Development, Cambridge University Press, published 2004, page 403:

     […] Yidinj has just one prefix dja:- 'in the direction of' […] . There is a noun djawa 'mouth' in a number of neighbouring languages […] and it is likely that this developed into the prefix dja:-. The semantic motivation would be the fact that Aborigines typically indicate direction by pointing with pursed lips (in circumstances where Europeans would extend a hand or index finger).

2. To draw up or contract into folds or wrinkles; to pucker; to knit.
   • c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iii], lines 1756-9:

     […] thou […] didst contract and purse thy brow together, / As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain / Some horrible conceit: […]

   • 1888–1891, Herman Melville, “[Billy Budd, Foretopman.] Chapter XIII.”, in Billy Budd and Other Stories, London: John Lehmann, published 1951, →OCLC:

     Upon hearing Billy's version, the sage Dansker seemed to divine more than he was told; and after a little meditation during which his wrinkles were pursed as into a point, quite effacing for the time that quizzing expression his face sometimes wore, "Didn't I say so, Baby Budd?"

3. To put into a purse.
   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iii], line 502:

     And I will go and purse the ducats straight,

4. (intransitive, obsolete, rare) To steal purses; to rob.
   • (Can we date this quote?), Francis Beaumont, John Fletcher, “Scornful Lady”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, Act I, scene i:

     Why I'll purse; if that raise me not, I'll bet at bowling alleys, or man whores: I would fain live by others.

• pucker

• pursy
• unpurse

• Pre-Us, Rupes, puers, pures, re-ups, reups, rupes, sprue, super, super-

• IPA^(key): /ˈpurse/

purse (genitive purske, partitive purset)

1. outburst
2. eruption
3. explosion
4. spurt, gush

• seemnepurse

pursua +‎ -e

• IPA^(key): /ˈpurseˣ/, [ˈpurs̠e̞(ʔ)]
• Rhymes: -urse
• Syllabification^(key): pur‧se

purse

1. excess material that gushes or bursts out, such as plaster from under a brick
2. (metallurgy) flash (material left around the edge of a moulded part at the parting line of the mould)

• “purse”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-03

• persu, perus, perus-, super-