brazen
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: brāzʹn
ipa: /ˈbɹeɪzən/
rhymes: -eɪzən
Forms: form: brazens
form: brazening
form: brazened
form: brazened
form: brasen
Etymology: From Middle English brasen, from Old English bræsen (“brazen, of brass”); equivalent to brass + -en (compare golden, wooden, etc.).
The word originally meant “of brass”; the figurative verb sense (as in brazen it out (“face impudently”)) dates from the 1550s (perhaps evoking the sense “face like brass, unmoving and not showing shame”), and the adjective sense “impudent” from the 1570s. Compare brass neck, bold as brass.
Senses: examples: text: [...] the meadows roughen, grow gutteral / with goldenrod, milkweed's late-summer lilac, / cat-tails, the wild lily brazening, / dooryards overflowing in late, rough-headed bloom: [...]
ref: 1986, Quarterly Journal of Ideology: QJI, volume 10, [Tahlequah, Okla.]: QJI Editorial Board, →ISSN, page 93:
glosses: To turn a brass color.
examples: text: And though the word doth eat up all they can ſay, as Moſes rod did: yet they harden their hearts with Pharaoh, they brazen their brows with him in the text, that ſaid I will not: Nay ſaid the Iſraelites, but we will have a King. [Commentary on Matthew 21:29.]
ref: 1656, John Trapp, “A Commentary or Exposition upon the Gospel According to St. Matthew”, in A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the New Testament. […], 2nd enlarged edition, London: Printed by R. W. and are to be sold by Nath. Ekins, […], →OCLC, page 274:
text: His impudence is only less than his ignorance, in referring his questioner to [John] Milton, in proof of the scriptural angels being celestial women. That gentleman mildly remarks, "Milton's angels are not Ladies." Instead of blushing, he brazens it out, and replies, "No—but some scriptural angels are Ladies—I believe"—shewing that he is as ignorant of his Bible as of Milton.
ref: 1832 November, “Noctes Ambrosianæ. No. LXIV.”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume XXXII, number CCI, Edinburgh: William Blackwood, […]; and T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC, page 870:
text: Sabina brazened it out before Mrs. Wygram; but inwardly she was resolved to be a good deal more circumspect.
ref: 1887, William Black, “Flight”, in Sabina Zembra […], volume I, London; New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 171:
text: [T]he historically minded modernist poet is uncertain whether there is any excuse at all for the existence of poets. He brazens out the dilemma by making cruel jokes at his own expense—jokes which he expects no one to see or to laugh at if seen.
ref: 1949, Robert Graves, “Modernist Poetry (with Laura Riding, 1926)”, in The Common Asphodel, Collected Essays on Poetry, 1922–1949, London: Hamish Hamilton, →OCLC, page 151:
text: [...] I've come to rely on a mental technique that I call powering through. [...] It's equivalent to brazening out an awkward social situation—accidentally squeezing the butt of a stranger wearing the same costume as your boyfriend at a Halloween party, say. Powering through or brazening out is almost always what I end up doing, but only after stifling my initial impulse to surrender or sink through the floor.
ref: 2007, Jennifer Brice, “Blue Storm”, in Unlearning to Fly, Lincoln, Neb.: University of Nebraska Press, →ISBN, page 169:
text: The drivers of the 507s Lost Convoy knew they were in a world of deep fecal matter. Could they brazen a path through the city once more and pick up Route Blue on the other side? Or would this morning's chain of unfortunate events finally catch up with them?
ref: 2008, Charles W. Sasser, God in the Foxhole: Inspiring True Stories of Miracles on the Battlefield, New York, N.Y.: Threshold Editions, Simon & Schuster, →ISBN:
glosses: Generally followed by out or through: to carry through in a brazen manner; to act boldly despite embarrassment, risk, etc.
Derived terms: brazen it out
brazen out
outbrazen