bedaub

American  

[bih-dawb] / bɪˈdɔb /

verb (used with object)

1. to smear all over; besmear; soil.

2. to ornament gaudily or excessively.

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bedaub British  

/ bɪˈdɔːb /

verb

1. to smear all over with something thick, sticky, or dirty

2. to ornament in a gaudy or vulgar fashion

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Other Word Forms

• unbedaubed adjective

Etymology

Origin of bedaub

First recorded in 1545–55; be- + daub

Example Sentences

So Meg wrestled alone with the refractory sweetmeats all that hot summer day, and at five o’clock sat down in her topsy-turvey kitchen, wrung her bedaubed hands, lifted up her voice and wept.

From Literature

Paying test subjects for the trouble and risk of swallowing, being injected with or bedaubed with drugs or other medical substances is accepted practice worldwide.

From Los Angeles Times

Our pessimist frauds and the Ibsensite pack Will groan as they thickly bedaub it in black.

From Project Gutenberg

To cover with dung, as for manuring; to bedaub or defile, literally or figuratively.

From Project Gutenberg

The young woman would not have been ill-looking, had she been well scrubbed, and all the yellow clay with which she was bedaubed, washed away.

From Project Gutenberg