blunt
adjectivenounverbcommon in dialogue
- United Kingdom//blʌnt//
- //blʊnt//
Having a thick edge or point; not sharp.
adjective
- 1
Having a thick edge or point; not sharp.
The murderous knife was dull and blunt.
The dinghy was trailing astern at the end of its painter, and Merrion looked at it as he passed. He saw that it was a battered-looking affair of the prahm type, with a blunt snout, and like the parent ship, had recently been painted a vivid green.
The face which emerged was not reassuring. It was blunt and grey, the nose springing thick and flat from high on the frontal bone of the forehead, whilst his eyes were narrow slits of dark in a tight bandage of tissue. […].
- 2
Dull in understanding; slow of discernment; opposed to acute.
His wits are not so blunt.
- 3
Abrupt in address; plain; unceremonious; wanting in the forms of civility; rough in manners or speech.
I was taken aback by the blunt admission that he had never liked my company.
a plain, blunt man
- 4
Hard to impress or penetrate.
December 30, 1736, Alexander Pope, letter to Jonathan Swift I find my heart hardened and blunt to new impressions.
- 5
Slow or deficient in feeling: insensitive.
Etymology
From Middle English blunt, blont, from Old English *blunt, probably of North Germanic origin, possibly related to Old Norse blunda (“to shut eyes, to doze”), related to blind (> Icelandic blunda, Swedish blunda, Danish blunde). Compare the Scandinavian-German munitons term blind (“non-live, dummy”), opposite of skarp (“live”, literally, “sharp”): Swedish and Danish blind patron (“dummy round”), Danish blindt skud, German blinder schuss (“dummy shot”), blinde granate (“dummy grenade”).
noun
- 1
A fencer's practice foil with a soft tip.
- 2
A short needle with a strong point.
- 3
slangA marijuana cigar.
[…] to make his point, lead rapper B-Real fired up a blunt in front of the cameras and several hundred thousand people and announced, “I'm taking a hit for every one of y'all!”
- 4
archaicMoney.
Down he goes to the Commons, to see the lawyer and draw the blunt[…]
- 5
A playboating move resembling a cartwheel performed on a wave.
verb
- 1
To dull the edge or point of, by making it thicker; to make blunt.
- 2
figurativeTo repress or weaken; to impair the force, keenness, or susceptibility, of
It blunted my appetite.
My feeling towards her have been blunted.
That settled the Merseysiders for a short while but it did not blunt the home side's spirit.
I'm not saying that thousands of folk are not being inconvenienced, because they most certainly are, but the impact of strikes on government has been blunted.
Etymology
From Middle English blunten, blonten, from the adjective (see above).
Forms
- plural
- blunts
- comparative
- blunter
- superlative
- bluntest
- past tense
- blunted
- past participle
- blunted
- present participle
- blunting
- third person singular
- blunts
blunt · Having a thick edge or point; not sharp.
Blunt · A surname transferred from the nickname.blur · To make indistinct or hazy, to obscure or dim.blurred · Out of focus; partially obscured; smudged.