blinder

English

Etymology

From blind +‎ -er.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈblaɪndə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈblaɪndɚ/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Adjective

blinder

1. comparative form of blind: more blind
   • 1830, William Pashley, The Voice of Reason in Defence of the Christian Faith:

     Ye who arrogate to yourselves that ye see more, or at least are not so blind as others; in your unbelieving conduct, allow me to say, ye are blinder than others; ye are even blinder than the most ignorant and illiterate.

Noun

blinder (plural blinders)

1. Something that blinds.
   • 1924, Herman Melville, chapter 15, in Billy Budd‎^[1], London: Constable & Co.:

     As it was, innocence was his blinder.

   • 2016 February 5, Wesley Schultz and Jeremy Fraites, “Ophelia”, in Cleopatra‎^[2], performed by The Lumineers:

     I, I, got a new girlfriend / She feels like he's on top / And I don't feel no remorse / And you can't see past my blinders

2. A bag or cloth put over the head of a difficult horse while it is being handled or mounted.
3. A screen attached to a horse's bridle preventing it from being able to see things to its side.
   • 1969, Kenzaburō Ōe, chapter 5, in John Nathan, transl., A Personal Matter, New York: Grove Press, page 84:

     From both sides of his head a blackness swiftly grew like blinders on a horse and darkly narrowed his field of vision.

   • 1978, Edward Said, Orientalism, New York: Vinatage, published 2003, Chapter 3, Part I, p. 207:

     Orientalism itself, furthermore, was an exclusively male province; like so many professional guilds during the modern period, it viewed itself and its subject matter with sexist blinders.

4. (Britain, slang) An exceptional performance.

   He played a blinder this afternoon on the cricket ground.

   • 1992, Glyn Maxwell, “Out of the Rain”, in Boys at Twilight: Poems 1990 to 1995, New York: Houghton Mifflin, published 2000, page 91:

     And we asked the blue winger, who in our game / had played what they call a blinder, to help out

5. (slang) A bout of heavy drinking; a bender.
   • 1985 May 2, John Maxton, Hansard:

     If a man goes out on a blinder, he might be charged with being drunk and incapable and therefore have a criminal record, although he is an honourable man.

6. (theater) A bright light used to blind the audience temporarily during a scene change.
   • 1992, The Lighting Journal, page 9:

     When the 'blinders' are switched off, and the audience's eyes given time to re-adjust, the new scene is in place […]

Synonyms

• (horse's blindfold): blinker, winker
• (exceptional performance): cracker

Derived terms

• peaky blinder

Translations

horse's eye shield

• Finnish: silmälappu (fi)
• French: œillère (fr) f
• Greek: παρωπίδα (el) (paropída)
• Ingrian: korvalappu
• Italian: paraocchi (it)
• Plautdietsch: Schuklaup f
• Portuguese: antolho m
• Spanish: orejera (es) f
• Swedish: skygglapp (sv) c

Verb

blinder (third-person singular simple present blinders, present participle blindering, simple past and past participle blindered)

1. (transitive) To fit (a horse) with blinders.
2. (transitive, figurative, by extension) To obstruct the vision of.
   • 1958, Sylvia Plath, “Above the Oxbow”, in The Collected Poems, New York: Harper & Row, page 88:

     […] We climb in hopes / Of such seeing up the leaf-shuttered escarpments, / Blindered by green, under a green-grained sky

   • 1986, Tessa Albert Warschaw, Rich is Better: How Women Can Bridge the Gap Between Wanting and Having It All — Financially, Emotionally, Professionally, Penguin, page 248:

     They think they're being focussed when they're really just blindering their eyes, as a farmer would a plough horse, to ways of getting to their goal faster.

Anagrams

• Brindle, brindle

French

Etymology

From blinde +‎ -er.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /blɛ̃.de/

• Audio

  (file)

Verb

blinder

1. to armor; to reinforce

Conjugation

Conjugation of blinder (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	blinder
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	blindant /blɛ̃.dɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		blindé /blɛ̃.de/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	blinde /blɛ̃d/	blindes /blɛ̃d/	blinde /blɛ̃d/	blindons /blɛ̃.dɔ̃/	blindez /blɛ̃.de/	blindent /blɛ̃d/
	imperfect	blindais /blɛ̃.dɛ/	blindais /blɛ̃.dɛ/	blindait /blɛ̃.dɛ/	blindions /blɛ̃.djɔ̃/	blindiez /blɛ̃.dje/	blindaient /blɛ̃.dɛ/
	past historic2	blindai /blɛ̃.de/	blindas /blɛ̃.da/	blinda /blɛ̃.da/	blindâmes /blɛ̃.dam/	blindâtes /blɛ̃.dat/	blindèrent /blɛ̃.dɛʁ/
	future	blinderai /blɛ̃.dʁe/	blinderas /blɛ̃.dʁa/	blindera /blɛ̃.dʁa/	blinderons /blɛ̃.dʁɔ̃/	blinderez /blɛ̃.dʁe/	blinderont /blɛ̃.dʁɔ̃/
	conditional	blinderais /blɛ̃.dʁɛ/	blinderais /blɛ̃.dʁɛ/	blinderait /blɛ̃.dʁɛ/	blinderions /blɛ̃.də.ʁjɔ̃/	blinderiez /blɛ̃.də.ʁje/	blinderaient /blɛ̃.dʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	blinde /blɛ̃d/	blindes /blɛ̃d/	blinde /blɛ̃d/	blindions /blɛ̃.djɔ̃/	blindiez /blɛ̃.dje/	blindent /blɛ̃d/
	imperfect2	blindasse /blɛ̃.das/	blindasses /blɛ̃.das/	blindât /blɛ̃.da/	blindassions /blɛ̃.da.sjɔ̃/	blindassiez /blɛ̃.da.sje/	blindassent /blɛ̃.das/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	blinde /blɛ̃d/	—	blindons /blɛ̃.dɔ̃/	blindez /blɛ̃.de/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Derived terms

• blindage

Descendants

• → Italian: blindare
• → Portuguese: blindar
• → Spanish: blindar

Further reading

• “blinder”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈblɪndɐ/

• Audio

  (file)

Adjective

blinder

1. comparative degree of blind

Adjective

blinder

1. inflection of blind:
   1. strong/mixed nominative masculine singular
   2. strong genitive/dative feminine singular
   3. strong genitive plural

Old Swedish

Etymology

From Old Norse blindr, from Proto-Germanic *blindaz.

Adjective

blinder

1. blind
2. invisible, obscure

Declension

Declension of blinder (strong)

singular	masculine	feminine	neuter
nominative	blinder	blind	blint
accusative	blindan	blinda	blint
dative	blindum blindom	blindri blindre	blindu blindo
genitive	blinds	blindrar	blinds
plural	masculine	feminine	neuter
nominative	blindir blinder	blindar	blind
accusative	blinda	blindar	blind
dative	blindum blindom	blindum blindom	blindum blindom
genitive	blindra blinda	blindra blinda	blindra blinda

Declension of blinder (weak)

singular	masculine	feminine	neuter
nominative	blindi, -e	blinda	blinda
accusative	blinda	blindu, -o	blinda
dative	blinda	blindu, -o	blinda
genitive	blinda	blindu, -o	blinda
plural	masculine	feminine	neuter
nominative	blindu, -o	blindu, -o	blindu, -o
accusative	blindu, -o	blindu, -o	blindu, -o
dative	blindu, -o	blindu, -o	blindu, -o
genitive	blindu, -o	blindu, -o	blindu, -o

Descendants

• Swedish: blind

Welsh

Etymology

From blin +‎ -der.

Pronunciation

• (North Wales, standard, colloquial) IPA^(key): /ˈblɪndɛr/
  • (North Wales, colloquial) IPA^(key): /ˈblɪndar/
• (South Wales) IPA^(key): /ˈblɪndɛr/

Noun

blinder m (plural blinderau)

1. (uncountable) tiredness, weariness, fatigue
2. (countable) trouble, affliction

Derived terms

• blinderog (“weary, tired, tiring”)
• blinderol (“tired, tiring, annoying, tedious”)
• blinderus (“wearisome, tiring; troublesome, troubling”)
• diflinder (“tirelessness”)
• gorflinder (“exhaustion, fatigue”)

Mutation

Welsh mutation
radical	soft	nasal	aspirate
blinder	flinder	mlinder	unchanged
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

References

• R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present), “blinder”, in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies