| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. |
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| beat |
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| PRONUNCIATION: |  b t |
| VERB: | Inflected forms: beat, beat·en ( bt n) or beat, beat·ing, beats
| | TRANSITIVE VERB: | 1a. To strike repeatedly. b. To subject to repeated beatings or physical abuse; batter. c. To punish by hitting or whipping; flog. 2a. To strike against repeatedly and with force; pound: waves beating the shore. b. To flap, especially wings. c. To strike so as to produce music or a signal: beat a drum. d. Music To mark or count (time or rhythm), especially with the hands or with a baton. 3a. To shape or break by repeated blows; forge: beat the glowing metal into a dagger. b. To make by pounding or trampling: beat a path through the jungle. 4. To mix rapidly with a utensil: beat two eggs in a bowl. 5a. To defeat or subdue, as in a contest. b. To force to withdraw or retreat: beat back the enemy. c. To dislodge from a position: I beat him down to a lower price. 6. Informal To be superior to or better than: Riding beats walking. 7. Slang To perplex or baffle: It beats me; I don't know the answer. 8. Informal a. To avoid or counter the effects of, often by thinking ahead; circumvent: beat the traffic. b. To arrive or finish before (another): We beat you home by five minutes. c. To deprive, as by craft or ability: He beat me out of 20 dollars with his latest scheme. 9. Physics To cause a reference wave to combine with (a second wave) so that the frequency of the second wave can be studied through time variations in the amplitude of the combination. | | INTRANSITIVE VERB: | 1. To inflict repeated blows. 2. To pulsate; throb. 3a. To emit sound when struck: The gong beat thunderously. b. To strike a drum. 4. To flap repeatedly. 5. To shine or glare intensely: The sun beat down on us all day. 6. To fall in torrents: The rain beat on the roof. 7. To hunt through woods or underbrush in search of game. 8. Nautical To sail in the direction from which the wind blows. | | NOUN: | 1. A stroke or blow, especially one that produces a sound or serves as a signal. 2. A pulsation or throb. 3. Physics A variation in amplitude that results from the superpositioning of two or more waves of different frequencies. When sound waves are combined, the variation is heard as a pulsation in the sound. 4. Music a. A steady succession of units of rhythm. b. A gesture used by a conductor to indicate such a unit. 5. A pattern of stress that produces the rhythm of verse. 6. A variable unit of time measuring a pause taken by an actor, as for dramatic effect. 7a. The area regularly covered by a reporter, a police officer, or a sentry: television's culture beat. b. The reporting of a news item obtained ahead of one's competitors. 8. often Beat A member of the Beat Generation. | | ADJECTIVE: | 1. Informal Worn-out; fatigued. 2. often Beat Of or relating to the Beat Generation. | | PHRASAL VERBS: | beat off 1. To drive away. 2. Vulgar Slang To masturbate. beat out Baseball To reach base safely on (a bunt or ground ball) when a putout is attempted. | | IDIOMS: | beat all To be impressive or amazing. Often used in negative conditional constructions: If that doesn't beat all! beat a retreat To make a hasty withdrawal. beat around (or about) the bush To fail to confront a subject directly. beat it Slang To leave hurriedly. beat the bushes To make an exhaustive search. beat the drum (or drums) To give enthusiastic public support or promotion: a politician who beats the drum for liberalism. beat up on 1. To attack physically. 2. To criticize or scold harshly. to beat the band To an extreme degree. | | ETYMOLOGY: | Middle English beten, from Old English baten. See bhau- in Appendix I. | | SYNONYMS: | beat, baste3, batter1, belabor, buffet2, hammer, lambaste, pound2, pummel, thrash These verbs mean to hit heavily and repeatedly with violent blows: was mugged and beaten; basted him with a stick; was battered in the boxing ring; rioting students belabored by police officers; buffeted him with her open palm; hammered the opponent with his fists; lambasted every challenger; troops pounded with mortar fire; pummeled the bully soundly; thrashed the thief for stealing the candy. See also synonyms at defeat.
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| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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