Dictionary.com
definitions

bearded

[beer-did]
See more synonyms for bearded on Thesaurus.com
adjective
  1. having a beard.
  2. having a hairlike growth or tuft, as certain wheats.
  3. having a barb, as a fishhook.

Origin of bearded

First recorded in 1350–1400, bearded is from the Middle English word beerdid. See beard, -ed3
Related formsbeard·ed·ness, nounnon·beard·ed, adjectiveun·beard·ed, adjective

beard

[beerd]
noun
  1. the growth of hair on the face of an adult man, often including a mustache.
  2. Zoology. a tuft, growth, or part resembling or suggesting a human beard, as the tuft of long hairs on the lower jaw of a goat or the cluster of hairlike feathers at the base of the bill in certain birds.
  3. Botany. a tuft or growth of awns or the like, as on wheat or barley.
  4. a barb or catch on an arrow, fishhook, knitting needle, crochet needle, etc.
  5. Also called bevel neck. Printing.
    1. the sloping part of a type that connects the face with the shoulder of the body.
    2. British.the space on a type between the bottom of the face of an x-high character and the edge of the body, comprising both beard and shoulder.
    3. the cross stroke on the stem of a capital G.
verb (used with object)
  1. to seize, pluck, or pull the beard of: The hoodlums bearded the old man.
  2. to oppose boldly; defy: It took courage for the mayor to beard the pressure groups.
  3. to supply with a beard.

Origin of beard

before 900; Middle English berd, Old English beard; cognate with German Bart, Dutch baard, Late Latin Langobardi Long-beards, name of the Lombards, Crimean Gothic bars, Latin barba (> Welsh barf), Lithuanian barzdà, OCS brada, Russian borodá; European Indo-European *bHaer-dhā, perhaps akin to barley1
Related formsbeard·like, adjectiveun·beard, verb (used with object)

Synonyms for beard

See more synonyms for on Thesaurus.com
7. confront, brave, dare, face, challenge.
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Related Words for bearded

shaggy, unshaven, bewhiskered, whiskered, bristly, bushy, hairy, hirsute, barbate, beardy, stubbled, stubbly

Examples from the Web for bearded

Contemporary Examples of bearded

Historical Examples of bearded

  • She went and bearded the aunt, and took the girl away bodily in her pony-cart.

    The Coryston Family

    Mrs. Humphry Ward

  • Footsteps sounded and his bearded roommate entered the room.

    Made in Tanganyika

    Carl Richard Jacobi

  • Cardan speaks of a bearded demon of Niphus, who gave him lessons of philosophy.

    The Phantom World

    Augustin Calmet

  • At the desk a bearded man of middle-age was glancing through some papers.

    The Destroyer

    Burton Egbert Stevenson

  • He was a robust Northman, bearded, and in the force of his age.

    Tales Of Hearsay

    Joseph Conrad

British Dictionary definitions for bearded

beard

noun
  1. the hair growing on the lower parts of a man's face
  2. any similar growth in animals
  3. a tuft of long hairs in plants such as barley and wheat; awn
  4. the gills of an oyster
  5. a barb, as on an arrow or fish-hook
  6. slang a woman who accompanies a homosexual man to give the impression that he is heterosexual
  7. printing the part of a piece of type that connects the face with the shoulder
verb (tr)
  1. to oppose boldly or impertinently
  2. to pull or grasp the beard of
Derived Formsbearded, adjective

Word Origin for beard

Old English beard; related to Old Norse barth, Old High German bart, Latin barba
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for bearded

beard

v.

c.1300, "to grow or have a beard," from beard (n.). The sense of "confront boldly and directly" is from Middle English phrases such as rennen in berd "oppose openly" (c.1200), reproven in the berd "to rebuke directly and personally" (c.1400), on the same notion as modern slang get in (someone's) face. Related: Bearded; bearding.

beard

n.

Old English beard "beard," from West Germanic *barthaz (cf. Old Frisian berd, Middle Dutch baert, Old High German bart, German bart), seemingly from PIE *bhardh-a- "beard" (cf. Old Church Slavonic brada, Lithuanian barzda, and perhaps Latin barba "beard").

The Greek and Roman Churches have long disputed about the beard. While the Romanists have at different times practised shaving, the Greeks, on the contrary, have strenuously defended the cause of long beards. Leo III. (795 AD) was the first shaved Pope. Pope Gregory IV., after the lapse of only 30 years, fulminated a Bull against bearded priests. In the 12th century the prescription of the beard was extended to the laity. Pope Honorius III. to disguise his disfigured lip, allowed his beard to grow. Henry I. of England was so much moved by a sermon directed against his beard that he resigned it to the barber. Frederick Barbarossa is said to have been equally tractable. [Tom Robinson, M.D., "Beards," "St. James's Magazine," 1881]

Pubic hair sense is from 1600s (but cf. neþir berd "pubic hair," late 14c.); in the 1811 "Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue," the phrase beard-splitter is defined as, "A man much given to wenching" (see beaver).

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
bearded in Science

beard

[bîrd]
  1. A tuft or group of hairs or bristles on certain plants, such as barley and wheat. The individual strands of a beard are attached to a sepal or petal.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.