bedeck
Americanverb (used with object)
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bedecks,
present (3rd person singular)
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bedecked,
past participle, past
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bedecking
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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bedecksimple
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bedeckssimple
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have bedeckedperfect
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has bedeckedperfect
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am bedeckingprogressive
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are bedeckingprogressive
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is bedeckingprogressive
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have been bedeckingperfect progressive
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has been bedeckingperfect progressive
Past
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bedeckedsimple
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had bedeckedperfect
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was bedeckingprogressive
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were bedeckingprogressive
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had been bedeckingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bedeck
Explanation
To bedeck is to decorate or embellish. If you bedeck your house with streamers and balloons, you'll feel prepared for your brother's surprise party. Some people like to bedeck their homes, inside and out, during various holidays. In December, you might bedeck your front door with a wreath, your yard with inflatable Santas and candy canes, and your indoor Christmas tree with tinsel and lights. You don't hear bedeck's root, the verb deck, all that often — but it appears in the Christmas carol "Deck the Halls," and it comes from the Middle Dutch dekken, "to cover."
Vocabulary lists containing bedeck
"The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet," Vocabulary from Act 3
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Chronicle of a Death Foretold
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The Left Hand of Darkness
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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:
The dining room table, where the sisters wrote, is strewn with manuscripts, quill pens and tea cups; a bonnet and shawl bedeck a chair in the small kitchen.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 14, 2026
With the magic of a clear glue varnish such as Modge Podge, you can bedeck everything from glassware, votives, pottery, frames, coasters and serving trays to handmade stationery or cards with your dried blossoms.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 15, 2023
So attention seemed merited by a 64-degree day when spring is in the air, fully formed blossoms bedeck the trees, and a weekend awaits us.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 25, 2022
Tents have been erected around Obama’s property and chairs and couches bedeck his spacious lawn for the last of the months-long preparations, according to the Mail.
From Fox News ● Aug. 7, 2021
Many thighbones he burned on the gods’ altars and many a woven and golden ornament hung to bedeck them, in his satisfaction; he had not thought life held such glory for him.
From "The Odyssey" by Homer
Hilberath said her tiny home is not big enough for her Christmas tree which instead bedecks the terrace but she was still grateful for the people who had helped put a roof over her head.
From Reuters ● Dec. 23, 2021
Save for a blip of a scene from “Thriller,” no official footage of music videos that might ignite a mote of nostalgia bedecks its architecture.
From Salon ● Mar. 3, 2019
Her distinctive crest, two facing T’s that resemble a medieval cross, bedecks ballet flats from Manhasset to Myanmar; her signature caftans billow above thousands of tummies; the vice president’s wife carries one of her handbags.
From New York Times ● Nov. 29, 2011
You shall know her, too, by the gold that bedecks her skirt, by the light that glimmers in her hair.'
From Stories from the Ballads Told to the Children by Katharine Cameron
Deck and bedeck are commonly said of apparel; as, a mother bedecks her daughter with silk and jewels.
From English Synonyms and Antonyms With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions by James Champlin Fernald
Downtown Munich is best-known for chic shops and flashy fast cars but right now its streets are bedecked with posters advertising next generation drones.
From BBC ● Feb. 16, 2026
Matt Gibson, 52, moors his sage-green houseboat, bedecked with plants, on the Regent's Canal near central London.
From Barron's ● Feb. 11, 2026
An hour later in a slightly sweaty hotel ballroom bedecked with “Unionize California” signs, Friedman was being treated like the belle of the ball at the California Labor Federation’s annual awards dinner.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 13, 2024
Renaissance and Medieval pieces, and the “quality camp” or “fantasy furniture” he favored — weird and whimsical pieces embellished with mythical creatures; chairs sprouting antlers, torcheres bedecked with gargoyles, commodes atop griffin feet.
From New York Times ● Feb. 27, 2024
The red-and-gold glass doors appeared, and she could see the wreaths and candles that bedecked the massive hall.
From "Throne of Glass" by Sarah J. Maas
It was a show of tradition as the procession approached the castle, with the bright flag bedecking the late queen’s coffin standing out amid the more somber tones.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 19, 2022
“The Abolitionists hoped that bedecking slaves in Union blue and enlisting us in a fight for our own freedom would make men of us,” Etheridge says.
From New York Times ● Feb. 14, 2022
All those holiday branches bedecking the boulevards in Chicago?
From Washington Post ● Jun. 10, 2021
Maxx and other retailers high and low, the masses are swooning over Beckham bedecking our favorite box store.
From Salon ● Apr. 1, 2017
Among other things, came to light brass jewelry,—Rag Fair gewgaws and baubles a plenty, more admired than all; Annatoo, bedecking herself like, a tragedy queen: one blaze of brass.
From Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I by Herman Melville
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.
