bespeak
Americanverb (used with object)
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bespeaks,
present (3rd person singular)
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bespoke,
past, past participle (Archaic)
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bespake,
past (Archaic)
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bespoken,
past participle
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bespeaking
present participle
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to ask for in advance.
to bespeak the reader's patience.
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to reserve beforehand; engage in advance; make arrangements for.
to bespeak a seat in a theater.
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Literary. to speak to; address.
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to show; indicate.
This bespeaks a kindly heart.
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Obsolete. to foretell; forebode.
verb
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to engage, request, or ask for in advance
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to indicate or suggest
this act bespeaks kindness
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poetic to speak to; address
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archaic to foretell
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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bespeaksimple
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bespeakssimple
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have bespokeperfect
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have bespokenperfect
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has bespokeperfect
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has bespokenperfect
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am bespeakingprogressive
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are bespeakingprogressive
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is bespeakingprogressive
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have been bespeakingperfect progressive
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has been bespeakingperfect progressive
Past
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bespakesimple
-
bespokesimple
-
had bespokeperfect
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had bespokenperfect
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was bespeakingprogressive
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were bespeakingprogressive
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had been bespeakingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bespeak
before 900; Middle English bespeken, Old English besprecan. See be-, speak
Explanation
To bespeak is to imply or signal something, the way your neighbor's electric car might bespeak concern for the environment. You can use this verb to mean "indicate" or "convey indirectly." Your city's excellent schools and smooth, well-cared-for streets may bespeak high taxes to people who are considering buying a house there. Your interest in foreign films and philosophy might bespeak a deep intelligence and curiosity to your teachers. And if you're really paying attention, you'll realize your friend's crankiness bespeaks her fear of starting at a new school next fall.
Vocabulary lists containing bespeak
Inquire Within: Synoynms for "Ask"
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The Portrait of a Lady
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Reveal
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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:
Whatever the validity of that charge, it doesn’t bespeak an administration indifferent to the fate of American political ideas abroad.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 26, 2026
For some time, we’ve existed in a cynical zone in which any public tears bespeak performance.
From New York Times ● Feb. 8, 2022
Personally I am devoted to Jake, his puppyish enthusiasm, his liveliness and fleetness of non-toxic banter which all bespeak a profound purity of soul.
From The Guardian ● Aug. 9, 2019
Robyn’s radical career moves bespeak that security; as a Canadian, I’ve seen how access to public health care alone widens artists’ range of choices.
From Slate ● Oct. 29, 2018
I requested Octav. to bespeak an Apparatus from a Glazier but he would not & defied me.
From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves" by M.T. Anderson
The film can hardly avoid being described as “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” meets “Enemy of the State,” and that such comparisons are so obvious bespeaks a certain lack of originality.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 10, 2026
In 1900, the average life expectancy of a 1-year-old in the U.S. was about 56 years; that bespeaks a morbid population of infants.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 3, 2025
But his many TV roles are marked by a sense of implacable stillness that bespeaks the maturity that comes from a long career.
From New York Times ● Dec. 30, 2022
But it bespeaks a fundamental and cruel misunderstanding of autonomy and liberty rights, and a return to something far more pernicious.
From Slate ● May 10, 2022
Fortified towns emerged in the third millennium B.C., with cemeteries whose great variation between unadorned and luxuriously furnished graves bespeaks emerging class differences.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
With that bespake the seven brethren, Making most piteous mone, "You may go kiss your jolly brown bride,55 And let our sister alone."
From English and Scottish Ballads, Volume II (of 8) by Various
Then bespake him Cornewall King, These were the words he said there: 80 "Did you ever know a comely King, His name was King Arthur?"
From English and Scottish Ballads, Volume I (of 8) by Various
She found herself in a large square room sparsely but comfortably furnished in a style that bespake it as the former sitting-room of the dead and buried Japhas.
From The Sword of Damocles A Story of New York Life by Anna Katharine Green
Thus, full attired In all her ornaments, she issued forth, And beck'ning Venus from the other pow'rs Of Heav'n apart, the Goddess thus bespake: 'Daughter, beloved!
From The Life and Writings of Henry Fuseli, Volume I (of 3) by John Knowles
Then bespake Cornwall King againe, These were the words said he.
From English and Scottish Ballads, Volume I (of 8) by Various
“We think it’s a much healthier and much more rational use of capital to allocate that to bespoke facilities that have long-term agreements tied to them.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2026
"The methods for defining stickiness that have been developed are always bespoke: They work for one material, at one size scale, in one condition. It's good for studying, but you can't do much with it."
From Science Daily ● Nov. 4, 2026
Falling for a bespoke arrangement of code remains a novel concept for most people, but it’s also an accessible alternative to isolation.
From Salon ● Oct. 23, 2026
The intervention follows the BBC's announcement that plans for a bespoke studio at its new Tea Factory headquarters in Digbeth would not go ahead.
From BBC ● Oct. 16, 2026
My father’s response bespoke his belief that the magistrate had no legitimate power over him.
From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela
The Pentagon's bespoken spokesman Ken Bacon is getting to be the harbinger of a lot of bad news about the Kosovo situation.
From Time Magazine Archive
Observers wondered if the 20,000 were more acutely bespoken by General Pershing and Commander Savage than they were by often-wounded Captain Jean Piot, a contributor to L'Oeuvre.
From Time Magazine Archive
Since one cannot bespeak until one has been bespoken, until the telepathic potentiality has been sensitized by one clear reception, I had to get through to him first.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
Roy had made her acquainted with his excellences as well as his peculiarities, and bespoken for him a worthy place in her regard.
From Jessamine A Novel by Marion Harland
In the mean time, half the tradesmen of Avignon, to say nothing of Aix, have bespoken caricatures of themselves by his hand.
From Harper's New Monthly Magazine, February, 1852 by
Pratt was stout, compact and level-eyed, with a raspy drawl bespeaking his childhood on the Louisiana bayou.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 28, 2025
But when you know that he thought of his look as bespeaking a kind of weightlessness, you could also surmise that he knew the price of such flight might be life itself.
From New York Times ● Oct. 14, 2020
For one thing, some of it is very funny, as in a tableau positioning two porcelain figurines of colonial-era gentry before a regal, glowering jet-black face looming above them, their graceful postures bespeaking total incomprehension.
From New York Times ● Jan. 4, 2018
On one of my infrequent breaks from forcing myself not to knock the thing back in three gulps, I sought to give the drink a name bespeaking its virtues and dubbed it the Gimletti Punch.
From Slate ● Dec. 5, 2013
He heard my voice bespeaking him as a dead man’s, his brother’s voice.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
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