bust

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A sculpture representing a person's head, shoulders, and upper chest.
2. n. A woman's bosom.
3. n. The human chest.
4. v. Slang To smash or break, especially forcefully: "Mr. Luger worked it with a rake, busting up the big clods, making a flat brown table” ( Garrison Keillor).
5. v. Slang To render inoperable or unusable: busted the vending machine by putting in foreign coins.
6. v. To cause to come to an end; break up: an attempt to bust the union.
7. v. To break or tame (a horse).
8. v. To cause to become bankrupt or short of money: "Too often, the promise of a high-tech design leads to a weapon that busts the budget” ( Business Week).
9. v. Slang To reduce in rank. See Synonyms at demote.
10. v. To hit; punch.
11. v. Slang To place under arrest.
12. v. Slang To make a police raid on.
13. v. Slang To undergo breakage; become broken.
14. v. Slang To burst; break: "Several companies have threatened to bust out of their high-wage contracts by the dubious technique of declaring bankruptcy” ( Washington Post).
15. v. To become bankrupt or short of money.
16. v. Games To lose at blackjack by exceeding a score of 21.
17. n. A failure; a flop: "The home-style bean curd is a bust, oily and rubbery” ( Mark and Gail Barnett).
18. n. A state of bankruptcy.
19. n. A time or period of widespread financial depression: "Bankers consider the region's diversified economy to be good protection against a possible real estate bust” ( American Banker).
20. n. A punch; a blow.
21. n. A spree: a fraternity beer bust.
22. n. Slang An arrest.
23. n. Slang A raid.
24. idiom. butt Vulgar Slang To make a strenuous effort; work very hard.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. A dialectal or vulgar form of burst.
2. n. A dialectal or vulgar form of burst.
3. n. Specifically, a spree: as, to go on a bust.
4. n. The chest, thorax, or breast; the trunk of the human body above the waist.
5. n. In sculpture, the figure of a person in relief, showing only the head, shoulders, and breast. The term may be applied to the head and neck only, or to the head and neck with the shoulders and breast, or to the head with the whole chest, or to the head, neck, breast, and shoulders, with the arms truncated above the elbow.
6. To put a tar-mark upon (sheep).
7. n. A tar-mark on sheep.
8. To break to the saddle, as an intractable bronco.

Wiktionary

1. n. A sculptural portrayal of a person's head and shoulders
2. n. The breasts and upper thorax of a woman
3. v. To break something
4. v. slang To arrest for a crime
5. v. slang To catch someone in the act of doing something wrong, socially and morally inappropriate, or illegal, especially when being done in a sneaky or secretive state.
6. v. snowboarding An emphatic to do
7. v. US, informal To reduce in rank.
8. v. poker To lose all of one's chips.
9. v. To exceed a score of 21.
10. n. slang The act of arresting someone for a crime, or raiding a suspected criminal operation:
11. n. slang A failed enterprise; a bomb.
12. n. sports, derogatory A player who is drafted at a high position and fails.
13. adj. slang without any money, broke

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A piece of sculpture representing the upper part of the human figure, including the head, shoulders, and breast.
2. n. The portion of the human figure included between the head and waist, whether in statuary or in the person; the chest or thorax; the upper part of the trunk of the body.
3. n. A woman's bosom{2}.
4. v. informal To arrest, for committing a crime; -- often used in the passive.
5. v. informal To break or burst.
6. v. (Card Playing) In blackjack, to draw a card that causes one's total to exceed twenty-one.
7. v. To go bankrupt.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. break open or apart suddenly and forcefully
2. n. a complete failure
3. v. go to pieces
4. n. an occasion for excessive eating or drinking
5. n. the chest of a woman
6. v. separate or cause to separate abruptly
7. v. ruin completely
8. v. search without warning, make a sudden surprise attack on
9. adj. lacking funds
10. n. a sculpture of the head and shoulders of a person