Addle
['æd(ə)l] or ['ædl]
Definition
(verb.) become rotten; 'addled eggs'.
(verb.) mix up or confuse; 'He muddled the issues'.
Checked by Archie--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) Liquid filth; mire.
(n.) Lees; dregs.
(a.) Having lost the power of development, and become rotten, as eggs; putrid. Hence: Unfruitful or confused, as brains; muddled.
(v. t. & i.) To make addle; to grow addle; to muddle; as, he addled his brain.
(v. t. & i.) To earn by labor.
(v. t. & i.) To thrive or grow; to ripen.
Edited by Georgina
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. [1]. Putrid, corrupt, spoiled (as eggs).[2]. Barren, unfruitful, fruitless, abortive, unproductive, unprolific, unfertile, sterile, infecund, addled.
Editor: Warren
Examples
- I never did see such a addle-headed old creetur! Charles Dickens. The Pickwick Papers.
- Don't addle their English brains with your classical rubbish, shouted Crispin satirically; if you do, they may wreck us. Fergus Hume. The Island of Fantasy.
- She stretched out a great red hand and arm on each side of her, so as to bar the doorway, and slowly nodded her addle head at me. Wilkie Collins. The Woman in White.
- You know he has nothing to recommend him but money and a ridiculous roll of addle-headed predecessors; now, don't you? Charles Dickens. Great Expectations.
- He might have spent the full term there, but, as already noted, his teacher had found him addled. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
Edited by Debra