beggar description

Idioms  

1. Defy or outdo any possible description, as in The stage set was so elaborate, it beggared description. This term, alluding to the idea that words are insufficient to do something justice, was already used by Shakespeare in Antony and Cleopatra (2:2), “For her own person It beggared all description.”

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Example Sentences

And from sun rise to sun set, I passed through scenes and experiences that beggar description.

From Slate • Oct. 23, 2019

The acoustics are so complex that they beggar description.

From Time Magazine Archive

As one courier after another returned with this same disheartening report, the terror and despair were such as to beggar description.

From Elsie at Nantucket by Finley, Martha

Day and night cease to be relative terms, while the strange effect and the magic brightness of a Polar night utterly beggar description.

From Due North or Glimpses of Scandinavia and Russia by Ballou, Maturin Murray

There are some scenes that beggar description, and this was such an one.

From Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter by Lynch, Lawrence L.