rubble

Meaning

Noun

• The broken remains of an object, usually rock or masonry.
• A mass or stratum of fragments of rock lying under the alluvium and derived from the neighbouring rock.
• The whole of the bran of wheat before it is sorted into pollard, bran, etc..

Origin

• From Middle English rouble, rubel, robel, robeil, from Anglo-Norman *robel. Presumably related to rubbish, originally of same meaning (bits of stone). Ultimately presumably from Proto-Germanic *reufaną, *raubōną, perhaps via Old French robe (English rob) in sense of “plunder, destroy”; see also Middle English, Middle French -el.