BRAZEN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does brazen mean? 

• BRAZEN (adjective)
  The adjective BRAZEN has 2 senses:

1. unrestrained by convention or propriety

2. made of or resembling brass (as in color or hardness)

  Familiarity information: BRAZEN used as an adjective is rare.

• BRAZEN (verb)
  The verb BRAZEN has 1 sense:

1. face with defiance or impudence

  Familiarity information: BRAZEN used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• BRAZEN (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Unrestrained by convention or propriety

Synonyms:

audacious; bald-faced; barefaced; bodacious; brassy; brazen; brazen-faced; insolent

Context example:

the modern world with its quick material successes and insolent belief in the boundless possibilities of progress

Similar:

unashamed (used of persons or their behavior; feeling no shame)

Derivation:

brazenness (behavior marked by a bold defiance of the proprieties and lack of shame)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Made of or resembling brass (as in color or hardness)

Classified under:

Relational adjectives (pertainyms)

Pertainym:

brass (an alloy of copper and zinc)

• BRAZEN (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they brazen    ... he / she / it brazens   
Past simple: brazened   
Past participle: brazened   
-ing form: brazening   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Face with defiance or impudence

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Context example:

brazen it out

Hypernyms (to "brazen" is one way to...):

dare; defy (challenge)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody

 Context examples 

"I was not dreaming," I said, with some warmth, for her brazen coolness provoked me.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Away they drove down the long green glade—bay horses, black and gray, riders clad in every shade of velvet, fur, or silk, with glint of brazen horn and flash of knife and spear.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I had steeled myself to brazen it out, though I was trembling inwardly; but the enormous strength of the man was too much for my fortitude.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

We have only to return home and report him as the brazen imposter that he is.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“We must keep a bold face and brazen it out until the last moment.”

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Then, with a cry of satisfaction, he bent forward and picked up a little brazen cylinder.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

When these hot fits were over, however, he would rush tumultuously in at the door and lock and bar it behind him, like a man who can brazen it out no longer against the terror which lies at the roots of his soul.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Holmes rushed to the top of the stairs to draw in the fresh air, and then, dashing into the room, he threw up the window and hurled the brazen tripod out into the garden.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But, ah! there is that ever shrieking brazen tongue which will not let us forget for one short hour that it is the arm of the savage, and not the hand of the master, which rules over the world.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Loud shrieked the brazen bugles from keep and from gateway, and merry was the rattle of the war-drum, as the men gathered in the outer bailey, with torches to light them, for the morn had not yet broken.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)