Bun
/bʌn/noun
A small, usually round bread roll or sweet baked item; the word also refers to several rounded shapes or forms.
Did you know?The bread sense is first recorded in English around the fifteenth century, but its ultimate origin remains uncertain; proposed links to French bugne, ‘a fritter,’ are plausible rather than proven.
Etymological Timeline
15th Century
English
bun
“A small cake or bread roll; the earliest English records appear in this period.”
16th Century
English
bun
“A sweet or enriched individual loaf, increasingly used for baked goods.”
17th Century
English
bun
“A small rounded bread or cake, including forms served as food.”
18th Century
English
bun
“The word expands to denote rounded masses and, later, a coiled hairstyle.”
Modern English
English
bun
“A bread roll, sweet pastry, rounded object, or gathered hairstyle.”