bizen

English

From Middle English bysen, partly from Old English bȳsen (“example, pattern, model, similitude, parable, parallel, rule, command, precept”), and partly from Old Norse býsn (“a wonder, a portentous thing”), both from Proto-Germanic *būsniz (“command, precept”), from Proto-Germanic *beudaną (“to ask, beg”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰewdʰ- (“to be awake, perceive fully”). Cognate with Gothic 𐌱𐌿𐍃𐌽𐍃 (busns, “command, order”).

bizen (plural bizens)

(UK dialects, Northern England, Scotland, rare, obsolete) Something monstrous or portentous; a shocking sight; sorry spectacle; disgraceful thing.
- 1823, Robert Anderson, Ballads in the Cumberland Dialect, page 155:
  She's a shem and a bizen to all the heale town.
- 1866, Eliza Lynn Linton, Lizzie Lorton of Greyrigg‎^[1], page 97:
  […] and a bizen like this.
- c. 1874, E. Waugh, Jannock ii. 13, as quoted in The English Dialect Dictionary and in the quotation, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (1887), of J. H. Nodal and G. Milnar's Gloss[ary of the] Lancashire Dial[ect] (1875):
  It'll be a sham an' a bizen, if we cannot find him a menseful of a dinner.
(UK dialects, Northern England, Scotland) Something serving as a warning or an example to be avoided.

^ Joseph Wright, editor (1902), “HOLY, adj.”, in The English Dialect Dictionary: […], volume III (H–L), London: Henry Frowde, […], publisher to the English Dialect Society, […]; New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons, →OCLC, page 214, column 1: “(2) — bizen or by·zont, a show, spectacle, or conspicuous or ridiculous object”