Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Informal A checking or restraining element: had to put the kibosh on a poorly conceived plan.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The form, manner, style, or fashion of something; the thing: as, that is the proper kibosh; full dress is the correct kibosh for the opera.
- n. Something indefinite; a thing of any kind not definitely conceived or intended: as, I'll give him the kibosh
- n. The thing in question; the stuff: as, that's the proper kibosh. Hence, specifically.
- n. The stuff used in filling cracks or giving finish or shadow to architectural sculptures, namely, Portland cement.
- n. Wages; money. Eng. Dial. Dict. (s. v. kybosh).
- n. Affectation; display; pretense.
- n. Stuff; nonsense; rubbish; bosh.
- n. To put the finishing touches on; perfect (one) in his trade.
- n. Intransitively, to do one's best.
- To finish off; knock out; squash completely; end.
- To throw kibosh, or Portland cement, upon (carved stonework) with a blowpipe and a brush, so as to enhance the shadows.
Wiktionary
- n. slang A checking or restraining element.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Slang Nonsense; stuff; also, fashion; style.
- n. Portland cement when thrown or blown into the recesses of carved stonework to intensify the shadows.
WordNet 3.0
- v. stop from happening or developing
Etymologies
- Unknown. Possibilities include: (Wiktionary)
- Origin unknown. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Let me suggest the Hebrew word kavash as a possible origin of the slang word kibosh.”
Simon & Schuster: The Right Word in the Right Place at the Right Time
“I love that word kibosh, reminds me so much of Joe Davola.”
“Spencer Parsons: "A little less than a year since the first public screenings, Warner Bros. has called the kibosh on performances of Brad Neely's Wizard People, Dear Reader, though no official legal action has been taken, and none appears imminent.”
“In the second place, there is nothing whatever in the connotation of "kibosh" that would prevent it appearing in the pages of your magazine.”
“She said, "Oh, don't tell them that, because you know that will put the 'kibosh' on it, and kill the whole thing.”
“And it took us only one day to put the "kibosh" on that particular scheme.”
“And all the time I was praying that the kid wouldn't wake up, come down out of the cab, and put the "kibosh" on me.”
“Just today I realized that you pronounce 'kibosh' like 'KYE-bosh.”
“Although Viner tells Sneed he has not been contacted by hotshot Hollywood agent Ari Emanuel, brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel -- rumors surfaced Ari may have been trying to put the "kibosh" on the book's publication.”
“_taboo_, that strange, sacred kibosh which is laid on certain acts, objects or localities throughout these far-flung islands.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘kibosh’.
-
Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
-
Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2053 more...
-
Stoppage
Stop words.
stop, freeze, hault, quit, nevermore, end, finish, complete, done, final, yield, pause and 14 more...
-
edward ryklin's list
viewy, kibosh, snark, rostrum, flummox, ossuary, cosset, cacography, grok, tonsorial, postprandial, eschatology and 7 more...
-
ecbrenner's list
flatline, luddism, apocalipstick, muttsucker, leviathan of fore..., flint, coryphaeus, donnybrook, bandwidth, bagpipe the mizen, cheesed off, asterism and 525 more...
-
The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
-
words
pointingstock, kibosh, turnspit, ant-bear, earthborn, pitter, infold, hayseed, stoker, prismatic, backcross, blizzard and 96 more...
-
thekatespanos's list
pomposity, gaggle, scintilla, lemming, bilk, vanquish, conflate, plenary, verisimilitude, perspicacious, rattletrap, obdurate and 325 more...
-
How very mikeropological..
Basically it's just mikeropology's words, but with his username turned into an adjectivally splendid list name.
mikeropology, squoze, anthropromorphism, mullu, spondylus, goobers, hipster, burnt umber, ochre, canvas, lapizure, burnt sienna and 172 more...
-
wunderkammer's Words
smarmy, bubkes, elucidate, togs, aeolian, carp, kibosh, bosky, ramshackle, mange, harpy, effervesce and 163 more...
-
caspermilktoast's Words
frenetic, farrago, fandango, ensemble, assay, emulsion, taut, winnow, ridonkulous, ginormous, frisson, idee fixe and 181 more...
-
ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
-
Favorite Words of AWP13
We asked attendees who visited the Wordnik booth what their favorite words were, and these are what they told us. (AWP is an annual conference for writers and those in the writing world.)
cling, declivity, susurrus, caramel, cataract, please, fester, reverie, kerplunk!, defenestration, colonel, ocean and 174 more...
-
Umbersorrow
Intangible, anthropic.
States of being are listed on oofy.njiju, glark, deplore, afterlithe, tagmass, spuriosity, forkful, chelation, oding, ploat, botnet, quedeship and 477 more...
-
bobfet1's Words
anathema, schadenfreude, sturm und drang, dadaism, serendipitous, obfuscate, kibosh, salacious, misogyny, kismet, madrasah, circumlocute and 129 more...
-
stpeter's Words
abase, abasement, abashed, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abhorrent, abide, abject, ablation, abnegation and 3536 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for kibosh.
alexz From Charles Dickens aka 'Boz'
http://books.google.ca/books?id=QTYYAAAAYAAJ 1837 "Put the Kye-bosh on her, Mary" p. 85
according to this book
http://books.google.ca/books?id=K18XAAAAYAAJ page 220, in the footnotes,
it comes from the name of an Irish Weapon
"Put the Gai- Bolga on him" they think it's an Americanism, but it's really from a Dickens book.
Wiki article about the Belly impaling weapon. Gae-Bolga
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%A1e_Bulg
May 18, 2013
BennoMekimi Given kibosh's early-19th c. entry into English, I wager its provenance from Arabic's kurbash - whip, riding crop, lash. Heritage gives the following as well: '1836, kye-bosk, in slang phrase put the kibosh on, of unknown origin, despite intense speculation. Looks Yiddish, but origin in early 19c. English slang seems to argue against this. One candidate is Ir. caip bháis, caipín báis "cap of death," sometimes said to be the black cap a judge would don when pronouncing a death sentence, but in other sources identified as a gruesome method of execution "employed by Brit. forces against 1798 insurgents" Bernard Share, "Slanguage, A Dictionary of Irish Slang".' May 18, 2013
chrissykp A recurring antagonist in some of the 'Casper the Friendly Ghost' movies is named Kibosh. He's the king of the ghosts and a stickler for rules, which often leads to conflict with Casper and his "uncles". Apr 17, 2012
john What you put on things to stop them. Apr 14, 2008