bedraggled
/bɪˈdɹæɡl̩d/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.13 in modern English
16
Scrabble Score
10
Letters
3
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Wet, limp, and unkempt; in disarray due to being doused with water, exposed to the elements, etc.
adj
Decaying, decrepit or dilapidated.
verb
simple past and past participle of bedraggle.
Example Sentences
- "A low rumbling sound was heard; a subterraneous hum; and then all held their breaths; as bedraggled with trailing ropes, and harpoons, and lances, a vast form shot lengthwise, but obliquely from the sea."
- "She came at night, and in a storm, with only two attendants, and stood before a peasant’s hut, tired, bedraggled, soaked with rain, “the red print of her lost crown still girdling her brow,” and implored admittance—and was refused!"
- "No three tramps that one could have met in a Surrey lane could have looked more hopeless and bedraggled."
- "As a rule he was neat in his person, but now his clothes were in disorder. He looked suddenly bedraggled. I was convinced he had been drinking, and I smiled."
- "Finally delivering “Room on Fire,” the follow-up to their much ballyhooed debut album, the well-heeled but stylishly bedraggled locals try to dispel accusations of one-trick-ponyism."
- "She is only coming to gloat over my bedraggled and flowerless borders and to sing the praises of her own detestably over-cultivated garden. I'm sick of being told that it's the envy of the neighbourhood; it's like everything else that belongs to her—her car, her dinner-parties, even her headaches, they are all superlative; no one else ever had anything like them."
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁ep-der. Proto-Indo-European *h₁épsder. Proto-Indo-European *h₁épider. Proto-Indo-European *h₁pi Proto-Germanic *bider. Proto-Germanic *bi- Proto-West Germanic *bi- Old English be- Middle English bi- English be- Proto-Indo-European *dʰregʰ- Proto-Indo-European *dʰrógʰ-e-ti Proto-Germanic *draganą Proto-West Germanic *dragan Old English dragan Middle English dragen Middle English draggen Low German draggeinflu. English drag Proto-Germanic *-lōną Old English -lian Middle English -len English -le English draggle English bedraggle English -ed English bedraggled From bedraggle + -ed.
Regional Pronunciation
- British English: /bɪˈdɹæɡl̩d/
Inflected Forms
more bedraggled (comparative)
most bedraggled (superlative)