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bleat

[bleet]

Example Sentences Origin

verb (used without object)

to utter the cry of a sheep, goat, or calf or a sound resembling such a cry.

verb (used with object)

to give forth with or as if with a bleat: He bleated his objections in a helpless rage.

to babble; prate.

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to run away hurriedly; flee.

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noun

the cry of a sheep, goat, or calf.

any similar sound: the bleat of distant horns.

foolish, complaining talk; babble: I listened to their inane bleat all evening.

Origin:
before 1000; Middle English bleten, Old English blǣtan; cognate with Dutch blaten, Old High German blāzen; akin to Latin flēre to weep

Related forms

bleat·er, noun

bleat·ing·ly, adverb

out·bleat, verb (used with object)

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To bleat

Example Sentences

In restaurants, the beep, chirp and bleat of cell phones has become so annoying that some have begun posting signs banning them.

Such companies frequently bleat that personal data is secure and inviolable.

Here are eight potential products coming soon from bioreactors that bloom, moo, and bleat.

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Collins

World English Dictionary

bleat (bliːt)

—vb
1.	(intr) (of a sheep, goat, or calf) to utter its characteristic plaintive cry
2.	(intr) to speak with any similar sound
3.	to whine; whimper

—n
4.	the characteristic cry of sheep, goats, and young calves
5.	any sound similar to this
6.	a weak complaint or whine

[Old English blǣtan; related to Old High German blāzen, Dutch blaten, Latin flēre to weep; see blare]

'bleater

—n

'bleating

—n, —*adj*

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

bleat

O.E. blætan, common W.Gmc., of imitative origin (cf. Gk. blekhe, O.C.S. blejat).

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Matching Quote

"When I hear the hypercritical quarreling about grammar and style, the position of the particles, etc., etc., stretching or contracting every speaker to certain rules of theirs ... I see that they forget that the first requisite and rule is that expression shall be vital and natural, as much as the voice of a brute or an interjection: first of all, mother tongue; and last of all, artificial or father tongue. Essentially your truest poetic sentence is as free and lawless as a lamb's bleat."

-Henry David Thoreau

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