bestir
Americanverb (used with object)
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bestirs,
present (3rd person singular)
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bestirred,
past participle, past
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bestirring
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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bestirsimple
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bestirssimple
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have bestirredperfect
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has bestirredperfect
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am bestirringprogressive
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are bestirringprogressive
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is bestirringprogressive
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have been bestirringperfect progressive
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has been bestirringperfect progressive
Past
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bestirredsimple
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had bestirredperfect
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was bestirringprogressive
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were bestirringprogressive
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had been bestirringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bestir
before 900; Middle English bistiren, Old English bestyrian to heap up. See be-, stir 1
Vocabulary lists containing bestir
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
It took a lot to bestir Angelenos from their bungalows and Buicks, but their throats felt like sandpaper, and their chests hurt like the blazes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 26, 2026
If the United States needs workers and desperate people in flight want to work, as Mr. Thiessen correctly argued, then Congress should bestir itself and reform the legal immigration system.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 10, 2022
Will they bestir themselves to action, or simply shrug their shoulders and accept what is already happening?
From Salon ● Aug. 4, 2021
This dual release will test the willingness of lockdown-weary audiences to bestir themselves from their by now severely dented couch cushions to see what the trade press still calls, with touching hopefulness, an “event picture.”
From Slate ● Jun. 29, 2021
"If he does not bestir himself soon, it may be too late," the stout man in the steel cap said.
From "A Game of Thrones" by George R.R. Martin
Even so, she eventually bestirs herself to tell Disciple that she wants a divorce.
From New York Times ● Sep. 23, 2019
While the federal government bestirs itself about alleged monopolies, the American Bar Association is suggesting an important amendment to the Clayton Act.*
From Time Magazine Archive
Now and then, one of the evening dailies bestirs itself to launch a crusade, e.g., the World-Telegram's recent series on slum landlords and university-student cheating.
From Time Magazine Archive
Almost nothing short of scandal ever bestirs the absentee owners to a concerted effort to exercise any real control over their company's affairs.
From Time Magazine Archive
Concerning the Gods, there are those who deny the very existence of the Godhead; others say that it exists, but neither bestirs nor concerns itself nor has forethought for anything.
From "Franny and Zooey" by J. D. Salinger
If they bestirred themselves to ask “how is he right?” those questions and his answers didn’t make it into the broadcast.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 17, 2024
And yet most of us have still not bestirred ourselves to care, much less to march in the streets demanding change.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 19, 2017
Slightly fewer than fifty-five per cent of all voting-age adults bestirred themselves to go to the polls.
From The New Yorker ● Apr. 23, 2017
There is no amount of lawlessness we will not, at our convenience, argue was bestirred by someone else’s choices or selfness or lack of vigilance.
From The Guardian ● Dec. 2, 2015
Frodo and Sam returned to their beds and lay there in silence resting for a little, while men bestirred themselves and the business of the day began.
From "The Two Towers" by J. R. R. Tolkien
IT was an occasion without precedent and another gauge of the new economic winds bestirring the Soviet Union.
From Time Magazine Archive
Al- though this report was denied in Madrid, it remains as indicative of the feeling bestirring liberal Spaniards concerning the Royal House.
From Time Magazine Archive
In the Japanese Diet, Premier Yoshida will often drowse through the opposition speeches, sometimes bestirring himself to deal with questions: "I will not answer that."
From Time Magazine Archive
Evidently the Son of Heaven was bestirring himself on behalf of his unhappy people.
From Time Magazine Archive
The sun rose in a cloudless sky long hours before society, as represented at our frontier city and station, followed suit, shook off the fetters of sleep and began bestirring itself for the day.
From A Soldier's Trial An Episode of the Canteen Crusade by Charles King
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
