bedumb
English edit
Etymology edit
From be- + dumb. Compare Middle English adumbien, from Old English ādumbian (“to become mute or dumb, keep silence, hold one’s peace”).
Verb edit
bedumb (third-person singular simple present bedumbs, present participle bedumbing, simple past and past participle bedumbed)
- (transitive) To make or render dumb, or mute.
- 1901, Herbert Trench, Deirdre wed and other poems - Page 39:
- These make no rustle save Some pine-cone dropt, or murmur that condemns Murmur; bedumb'd with moss that giant nave.
- 1902, Frederick Strange Kolle, Pen lyrics - Page 11:
- Let not the melancholy past / Bedumb your hardened ears; [...]
- 1964, John Holloway, The lion hunt: a pursuit of poetry and reality - Page 18:
- Our disease is not smugness, but the anxiety that bedumbs the singer.