Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The practice of killing persons for the purpose of selling the bodies for dissection.
- noun Killing by suffocation; figuratively, a private suppression of a proposition, bill, or the like.
- noun Specifically, in medicine, suffocation due to tonic spasm of the muscles of respiration.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb Present participle of
burke .
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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The claim made in the Observer that the 18th-century obstetricians, given that they obtained the corpses of the pregnant women that they experimented upon through "burking" - having people murdered to order - came as a shock to many medics.
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"Smellie and Hunter were responsible for a series of 18th-century 'burking' murders of pregnant women, with a death total greater than the combined murders committed by Burke and Hare and Jack the Ripper," writes Don Shelton, a historian.
Latest news from the public and voluntary sectors, including health, children, local government and social care, plus SocietyGuardian jobs | guardian.co.uk Denis Campbell 2010
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"Smellie and Hunter were responsible for a series of 18th-century 'burking' murders of pregnant women, with a death total greater than the combined murders committed by Burke and Hare and Jack the Ripper," writes Don Shelton, a historian.
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"Smellie and Hunter were responsible for a series of 18th-century 'burking' murders of pregnant women, with a death total greater than the combined murders committed by Burke and Hare and Jack the Ripper," writes Don Shelton, a historian.
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"Smellie and Hunter were responsible for a series of 18th-century 'burking' murders of pregnant women, with a death total greater than the combined murders committed by Burke and Hare and Jack the Ripper," writes Don Shelton, a historian.
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"Smellie and Hunter were responsible for a series of 18th-century 'burking' murders of pregnant women, with a death total greater than the combined murders committed by Burke and Hare and Jack the Ripper," writes Don Shelton, a historian.
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In spite of all this burking of crime, UP stands first in whole of India in terms of crime against dalits.
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That became their MO, and the origin of the modern term "burking."
Break No Bones Reichs, Kathy 2006
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When Bishop and Williams (no relation to the writer) were hanged for burking, i.e., murdering people in order to provide "subjects" for dissection, their bodies were sent to
Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 Various
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Looking at it so, it was plain that you were _suppressing_ the cameo -- burking it; since, once taken as you had taken it, it could never come to light again.
Martin Hewitt, Investigator Arthur Morrison 1904
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