A heraldic term possibly referring to a type of fur used in coat-of-arms designs, or an ornamental element in medieval heraldry.
From heraldic terminology, possibly from Old French 'bufre' or similar roots. Heraldic vocabulary is highly specialized and often preserves archaic forms of words.
Heraldic terms like baufrey survived in obscure medieval documents because they were too specialized to change—only experts read them, so the old words never got modernized like everyday language did.
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