burke

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To suppress or extinguish quietly; stifle: burked the investigation by failing to reappoint the commission.
2. v. To avoid; disregard: "To make The Tempest a tragic and depressing play he was willing to burke all the elements that made it the exact opposite” ( Robert M. Adams).
3. v. To execute (someone) by suffocation so as to leave the body intact and suitable for dissection.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To murder by suffocation in order to sell the body for dissection. This method was selected because it left no marks of violence upon the victims.
2. Figuratively, to smother; shelve; get rid of by some indirect manœuver: as, to burke a parliamentary question.

Wiktionary

1. v. To murder by suffocation, or so as to produce few marks of violence, for the purpose of obtaining a body to be sold for dissection.
2. v. To smother; to conceal, hush up, suppress.
3. n. UK, slang Variant spelling of berk.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. To murder by suffocation, or so as to produce few marks of violence, for the purpose of obtaining a body to be sold for dissection.
2. v. To dispose of quietly or indirectly; to suppress; to smother; to shelve.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. British statesman famous for his oratory; pleaded the cause of the American colonists in British Parliament and defended the parliamentary system (1729-1797)
2. v. murder without leaving a trace on the body
3. n. United States frontierswoman and legendary figure of the Wild West noted for her marksmanship (1852-1903)
4. v. get rid of, silence, or suppress