Home › Glossary › Letter B

beruffled

Adjective
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Ruffled or disordered by strong wind. The thrush’s feathers are disturbed as it sings in the stormy weather.

Detailed Definition
“Beruffled” means thoroughly ruffled or tousled, especially by wind. Hardy’s compound-like adjective emphasizes the bird’s frailty: despite its disordered plumage and the harsh conditions, it produces an ecstatic song.
Example
Example in poetry:
“In blast-beruffled plume,” describes feathers disordered by a gust of wind; “beruffled” combines the prefix be- with ruffled to intensify disturbance; “her beruffled hair held rain and leaves” adapts the adjective to a human figure; the word’s texture suits elegy or storm scenes because sound and meaning both suggest agitation
Additional Notes
The quoted word is an uncommon literary adjective formed from “ruffled,” and its wind-related sense is not everyday vocabulary.; Found in the poem, The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy
Also Known As
disheveled tousled rumpled
Skip to main content