Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Burke \Burke\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Burked}; p. pr. & vb. n.
   {Burking}.] [From one Burke of Edinburgh, who committed the
   crime in 1829.]
   1. To murder by suffocation, or so as to produce few marks of
      violence, for the purpose of obtaining a body to be sold
      for dissection.

   2. To dispose of quietly or indirectly; to suppress; to
      smother; to shelve; as, to burke a parliamentary question.

            The court could not burke an inquiry, supported by
            such a mass of a affidavits.          --C. Reade.