Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Besom

Besom ({not transcribed}) , noun

[Old English besme, besum, Anglo-Saxon besma; akin to Dutch bezem, OHG pesamo, German besen; of uncertain origin.]

A brush of twigs for sweeping; a broom; anything which sweeps away or destroys. [Archaic or Figurative]
I will sweep it with the besom of destruction. — Isa. xiv. 23
The housemaid with her besom. — W. Irving

Besom ({not transcribed}) , transitive verb

To sweep, as with a besom. [Archaic or Poetic] — Cowper
Rolls back all Greece, and besoms wide the plain. — Barlow