beard

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English[edit]

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 Beard (disambiguation) on Wikipedia
A person with a prominent beard.

Etymology[edit]

From Middle English berd, bard, bærd, from Old English beard, from Proto-Germanic *bardaz (compare West Frisian burd, Dutch baard, German Bart), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰardʰeh₂ (compare Latin barba, Lithuanian barzda, Russian борода́ (borodá)).

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

beard (plural beards)

  1. Facial hair on the chin, cheeks and jaw.
  2. The cluster of small feathers at the base of the beak in some birds.
  3. The appendages to the jaw in some cetaceans, and to the mouth or jaws of some fishes.
  4. The byssus of certain shellfish.
  5. The gills of some bivalves, such as the oyster.
  6. In insects, the hairs of the labial palpi of moths and butterflies.
  7. (botany) Long or stiff hairs on a plant; the awn.
    the beard of grain
  8. A barb or sharp point of an arrow or other instrument, projecting backward to prevent the head from being easily drawn out.
  9. That part of the underside of a horse's lower jaw which is above the chin, and bears the curb of a bridle.
  10. (printing, dated) That part of a type which is between the shoulder of the shank and the face.
  11. (LGBT, slang) A fake customer or companion, especially a woman who accompanies a gay male in order to give the impression that he is heterosexual.

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Verb[edit]

beard (third-person singular simple present beards, present participle bearding, simple past and past participle bearded)

  1. (obsolete) To grow hair on the chin and jaw.
  2. To boldly and bravely oppose or confront, often to the chagrin of the one being bearded.
    Robin Hood is always shown as bearding the Sheriff of Nottingham.
    • Macaulay
      No admiral, bearded by three corrupt and dissolute minions of the palace, dared to do more than mutter something about a court martial.
    • Crockett Johnson Barnaby, December 6, 1943
      We need all our operatives to insure the success of my plan to beard this Claus in his den...
    • Ross Macdonald, The Chill, 1963, pg.92, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard
      . . . I bearded the judge in his chambers and told him that it shouldn't be allowed.
  3. (transitive) To take by the beard; to seize, pluck, or pull the beard of (a man), in anger or contempt.
  4. (transitive) To deprive (an oyster or similar shellfish) of the gills.

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