BEAT

beat

(noun) the act of beating to windward; sailing as close as possible to the direction from which the wind is blowing

beat

(noun) a stroke or blow; “the signal was two beats on the steam pipe”

beat

(noun) a regular rate of repetition; “the cox raised the beat”

rhythm, beat, musical rhythm

(noun) the basic rhythmic unit in a piece of music; “the piece has a fast rhythm”; “the conductor set the beat”

meter, metre, measure, beat, cadence

(noun) (prosody) the accent in a metrical foot of verse

beat

(noun) the sound of stroke or blow; “he heard the beat of a drum”

pulse, pulsation, heartbeat, beat

(noun) the rhythmic contraction and expansion of the arteries with each beat of the heart; “he could feel the beat of her heart”

beat, round

(noun) a regular route for a sentry or policeman; “in the old days a policeman walked a beat and knew all his people by name”

beatnik, beat

(noun) a member of the beat generation; a nonconformist in dress and behavior

beat

(noun) a single pulsation of an oscillation produced by adding two waves of different frequencies; has a frequency equal to the difference between the two oscillations

exhaust, wash up, beat, tucker, tucker out

(verb) wear out completely; “This kind of work exhausts me”; “I’m beat”; “He was all washed up after the exam”

perplex, vex, stick, get, puzzle, mystify, baffle, beat, pose, bewilder, flummox, stupefy, nonplus, gravel, amaze, dumbfound

(verb) be a mystery or bewildering to; “This beats me!”; “Got me--I don’t know the answer!”; “a vexing problem”; “This question really stuck me”

beat, beat out, crush, shell, trounce, vanquish

(verb) come out better in a competition, race, or conflict; “Agassi beat Becker in the tennis championship”; “We beat the competition”; “Harvard defeated Yale in the last football game”

outwit, overreach, outsmart, outfox, beat, circumvent

(verb) beat through cleverness and wit; “I beat the traffic”; “She outfoxed her competitors”

beat, beat up, work over

(verb) give a beating to; subject to a beating, either as a punishment or as an act of aggression; “Thugs beat him up when he walked down the street late at night”; “The teacher used to beat the students”

beat

(verb) hit repeatedly; “beat on the door”; “beat the table with his shoe”

beat, scramble

(verb) stir vigorously; “beat the egg whites”; “beat the cream”

beat

(verb) shape by beating; “beat swords into ploughshares”

beat

(verb) produce a rhythm by striking repeatedly; “beat the drum”

beat

(verb) make by pounding or trampling; “beat a path through the forest”

pulsate, beat, quiver

(verb) move with or as if with a regular alternating motion; “the city pulsated with music and excitement”

beat, pound, thump

(verb) move rhythmically; “Her heart was beating fast”

beat

(verb) indicate by beating, as with the fingers or drumsticks; “Beat the rhythm”

beat

(verb) sail with much tacking or with difficulty; “The boat beat in the strong wind”

beat, flap

(verb) move with a flapping motion; “The bird’s wings were flapping”

beat, flap

(verb) move with a thrashing motion; “The bird flapped its wings”; “The eagle beat its wings and soared high into the sky”

beat

(verb) glare or strike with great intensity; “The sun was beating down on us”

drum, beat, thrum

(verb) make a rhythmic sound; “Rain drummed against the windshield”; “The drums beat all night”

tick, ticktock, ticktack, beat

(verb) make a sound like a clock or a timer; “the clocks were ticking”; “the grandfather clock beat midnight”

beat, bunk

(verb) avoid paying; “beat the subway fare”

beat

(verb) be superior; “Reading beats watching television”; “This sure beats work!”

Source: WordNet® 3.1

Etymology 1

Noun

beat (plural beats)

A stroke; a blow.

A pulsation or throb.

A pulse on the beat level, the metric level at which pulses are heard as the basic unit. Thus a beat is the basic time unit of a piece.

A rhythm.

(music) The rhythm signalled by a conductor or other musician to the members of a group of musicians.

The interference between two tones of almost equal frequency

(authorship) A short pause in a play, screenplay, or teleplay, for dramatic or comedic effect; a plot point or story development.

The route patrolled by a police officer or a guard.

(by extension) An area of a person's responsibility, especially

In journalism, the primary focus of a reporter's stories (such as police/courts, education, city government, business etc.).

(dated) An act of reporting news or scientific results before a rival; a scoop.

(colloquial, dated) That which beats, or surpasses, another or others.

(dated or obsolete, Southern US) A precinct.

(dated) A place of habitual or frequent resort.

(archaic) A low cheat or swindler.

The instrumental portion of a piece of hip-hop music.

(hunting) The act of scouring, or ranging over, a tract of land to rouse or drive out game; also, those so engaged, collectively.

(fencing) A smart tap on the adversary's blade.

Verb

beat (third-person singular simple present beats, present participle beating, simple past beat, past participle beat or beaten)

(transitive) To hit; strike

Synonyms: knock, pound, strike, hammer, whack, Thesaurus:attack, Thesaurus:hit

(transitive) To strike or pound repeatedly, usually in some sort of rhythm.

(intransitive) To strike repeatedly; to inflict repeated blows; to knock vigorously or loudly.

(intransitive) To move with pulsation or throbbing.

(transitive) To win against; to defeat or overcome; to do better than, outdo, or excel (someone) in a particular, competitive event.

(intransitive, nautical) To sail to windward using a series of alternate tacks across the wind.

(transitive) To strike (water, foliage etc.) in order to drive out game; to travel through (a forest etc.) for hunting.

To mix food in a rapid fashion. Compare whip.

(transitive, UK, In haggling for a price) of a buyer, to persuade the seller to reduce a price

Synonym: negotiate

(transitive) To indicate by beating or drumming.

To tread, as a path.

To exercise severely; to perplex; to trouble.

To be in agitation or doubt.

To make a sound when struck.

(military, intransitive) To make a succession of strokes on a drum.

To sound with more or less rapid alternations of greater and less intensity, so as to produce a pulsating effect; said of instruments, tones, or vibrations, not perfectly in unison.

(transitive) To arrive at a place before someone.

(intransitive, UK, slang, vulgar) To have sexual intercourse.

Synonyms: do it, get it on, have sex, shag, Thesaurus:copulate

(transitive, slang) To rob.

Adjective

beat (comparative more beat, superlative most beat)

(US slang) exhausted

dilapidated, beat up

(gay slang) fabulous

(slang) boring

(slang, of a person) ugly

Synonyms

• (exhausted): See also fatigued

• (dilapidated): See also ramshackle

• (fabulous): fantabulosa; See also wonderful

• (boring): See also boring

• (ugly): See also ugly

Etymology 2

Noun

beat (plural beats)

A beatnik.

Anagrams

• Bate, Beta, Teba, abet, bate, beta

Source: Wiktionary

Beat, v. t. [imp. Beat; p. p. Beat, Beaten (; p. pr. & vb. n. Beating.] Etym: [OE. beaten, beten, AS. beátan; akin to Icel. bauta, OHG. b. Cf. 1st Butt, Button.]

1. To strike repeatedly; to lay repeated blows upon; as, to beat one's breast; to beat iron so as to shape it; to beat grain, in order to force out the seeds; to beat eggs and sugar; to beat a drum. Thou shalt beat some of it [spices] very small. Ex. xxx. 36. They did beat the gold into thin plates. Ex. xxxix. 3.

2. To punish by blows; to thrash.

3. To scour or range over in hunting, accompanied with the noise made by striking bushes, etc., for the purpose of rousing game. To beat the woods, and rouse the bounding prey. Prior.

4. To dash against, or strike, as with water or wind. A frozen continent . . . beat with perpetual storms. Milton.

5. To tread, as a path. Pass awful gulfs, and beat my painful way. Blackmore.

6. To overcome in a battle, contest, strife, race, game, etc.; to vanquish or conquer; to surpass. He beat them in a bloody battle. Prescott. For loveliness, it would be hard to beat that. M. Arnold.

7. To cheat; to chouse; to swindle; to defraud; -- often with out. [Colloq.]

8. To exercise severely; to perplex; to trouble. Why should any one . . . beat his head about the Latin grammar who does not intend to be a critic Locke.

9. (Mil.)

Definition: To give the signal for, by beat of drum; to sound by beat of drum; as, to beat an alarm, a charge, a parley, a retreat; to beat the general, the reveille, the tattoo. See Alarm, Charge, Parley, etc. To beat down, to haggle with (any one) to secure a lower price; to force down. [Colloq.] -- To beat into, to teach or instill, by repetition.

– To beat off, to repel or drive back.

– To beat out, to extend by hammering.

– To beat out of a thing, to cause to relinquish it, or give it up. "Nor can anything beat their posterity out of it to this day." South.

– To beat the dust. (Man.) (a) To take in too little ground with the fore legs, as a horse. (b) To perform curvets too precipitately or too low.

– To beat the hoof, to walk; to go on foot.

– To beat the wing, to flutter; to move with fluttering agitation.

– To beat time, to measure or regulate time in music by the motion of the hand or foot.

– To beat up, to attack suddenly; to alarm or disturb; as, to beat up an enemy's quarters.

Syn.

– To strike; pound; bang; buffet; maul; drub; thump; baste; thwack; thrash; pommel; cudgel; belabor; conquer; defeat; vanquish; overcome.

Beat, v. i.

1. To strike repeatedly; to inflict repeated blaows; to knock vigorously or loudly. The men of the city . . . beat at the door. Judges. xix. 22.

2. To move with pulsation or throbbing. A thousand hearts beat happily. Byron.

3. To come or act with violence; to dash or fall with force; to strike anything, as, rain, wind, and waves do. Sees rolling tempests vainly beat below. Dryden. They [winds] beat at the crazy casement. Longfellow. The sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wisbed in himself to die. Jonah iv. 8. Public envy seemeth to beat chiefly upon ministers. Bacon.

4. To be in agitation or doubt. [Poetic] To still my beating mind. Shak .

5. (Naut.)

Definition: To make progress against the wind, by sailing in a zigzag line or traverse.

6. To make a sound when struck; as, the drums beat.

7. (Mil.)

Definition: To make a succession of strokes on a drum; as, the drummers beat to call soldiers to their quarters.

8. (Acoustics & Mus.)

Definition: To sound with more or less rapid alternations of greater and less intensity, so as to produce a pulsating effect; -- said of instruments, tones, or vibrations, not perfectly in unison. A beating wind (Naut.), a wind which necessitates tacking in order to make progress.

– To beat about, to try to find; to search by various means or ways. Addison.

– To beat about the bush, to approach a subject circuitously.

– To beat up and down (Hunting), to run first one way and then another; -- said of a stag.

– To beat up for recruits, to go diligently about in order to get helpers or participators in an enterprise.

Beat, n.

1. A stroke; a blow. He, with a careless beat, Struck out the mute creation at a heat. Dryden.

2. A recurring stroke; a throb; a pulsation; as, a beat of the heart; the beat of the pulse.

3. (Mus.) (a) The rise or fall of the hand or foot, marking the divisions of time; a division of the measure so marked. In the rhythm of music the beat is the unit. (b) A transient grace note, struck immediately before the one it is intended to ornament.

4. (Acoustics & Mus.)

Definition: A sudden swelling or reënforcement of a sound, recurring at regular intervals, and produced by the interference of sound waves of slightly different periods of vibrations; applied also, by analogy, to other kinds of wave motions; the pulsation or throbbing produced by the vibrating together of two tones not quite in unison. See Beat, v. i., 8.

5. A round or course which is frequently gone over; as, a watchman's beat.

6. A place of habitual or frequent resort.

7. A cheat or swindler of the lowest grade; -- often emphasized by dead; as, a dead beat. [Low] Beat of drum (Mil.), a succession of strokes varied, in different ways, for particular purposes, as to regulate a march, to call soldiers to their arms or quarters, to direct an attack, or retreat, etc.

– Beat of a watch, or clock, the stroke or sound made by the action of the escapement. A clock is in beat or out of beat, according as the strokes is at equal or unequal intervals.

Beat, a.

Definition: Weary; tired; fatigued; exhausted. [Colloq.] Quite beat, and very much vexed and disappointed. Dickens.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition

BEAT

Etymology 1

Noun

Verb

Adjective

Synonyms

Etymology 2

Noun

Anagrams

Word of the Day

AWRY

Do you know this game?