bewrite

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English

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Etymology

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From Middle English bewriten, from Old English bewrītan (to write, record, copy), from Proto-West Germanic *biwrītan (to write down; write about), equivalent to be- (about, over) +‎ write. Cognate with Old Frisian biwrīta (to write down), Middle Low German bewriten (to engrave; to pronounce a blessing), German bereiẞen (to scale something by hand, carry out manually). Compare also Dutch beschrijven (to describe), German beschreiben (to describe), Swedish beskriva (to describe).

Pronunciation

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Verb

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bewrite (third-person singular simple present bewrites, present participle bewriting, simple past bewrote, past participle bewritten)

  1. (transitive) To write about; describe.
    • 1838, The Yale literary magazine, volume 3:
      I vow and purpose, here in the presence of " Billy Shakspeare," to bewrite this ill-starred foolscap!!
    • 1878, Philip Dwyer, The Diocese of Killaloe from the Reformation to the close of the Eighteenth century:
      I humbly beg of you, for God's sake and your own, to read what I here presume to bewrite: [...]
    • 1926, Blanche Colton Williams, Best American stories:
      "I said it was a pleasureful thing to be thus bewritten upward. [...]"
    • 2011, The history of the Chronoswiss brand can only reach:
      This harvesting bewrites the unhealable Monogrammed Beach Towels of affair and assenting a brew-house.
  2. (transitive) To write to.
    • 1905, Charles Hallam Elton Brookfield, Frances Mary Brookfield, Mrs. Brookfield and her circle: Volume 1:
      After I bewrote thee yesterday Mrs. Neville drove Lady Charlotte, young Bagot (Clerk) and self into Glastonbury.
  3. (transitive) To write; write from; copy.
    • 1850, Donald Grant Mitchell, The battle summer::
      And it was in just one of these accessions of strength, (which after all, I count only as seductive illusions,) that I found myself with pen and paper, bewriting page after page — sketching men and scenes that I thought you would be glad to see, [...]

Derived terms

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