discombobulate

English

WOTD – 9 May 2006

Alternative forms

• discomboberate
• discombulate
• discombobricate

Etymology

1834 US, fanciful variant of discompose, discomfit, etc., originally discombobricate.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌdɪs.kəmˈbɒb.jəˌleɪt/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (AU):

  (file)

Verb

1. (transitive, humorous) To throw into a state of confusion; to befuddle or perplex.

Antonyms

• combobulate
• recombobulate

Translations

to befuddle

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 使困惑 (shǐkùnhuò), 使迷惑 (shǐmíhuò)

• Czech: zblbnout (cs), vykolejit
• Danish: forvirre
• Dutch: in de war schoppen, verstoren (nl)
• Finnish: hämmentää (fi), hämätä (fi), panna pasmat sekaisin
• French: décontenancer (fr), déconfire (fr), déconcerter (fr)
• German: verwirren (de)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Italian: scombussolare (it)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: forvirre (no)

  Nynorsk: forvirre

• Russian: сбить с толку n (sbitʹ s tolku), смути́ть (ru) n (smutítʹ), вы́бить из колеи n (výbitʹ iz kolei)
• Serbo-Croatian: збунити (zbuniti), помутити (pomutiti), избити из колосека (izbiti iz koloseka)
• Spanish: desconcertar (es), confundir (es)

See also

• Appendix:Fanciful 19th century American coinages