bald
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /bɔːld/
ipa: /bəʊld/
ipa: [bɒʊld]
ipa: /bɑːld/
ipa: /bɔld/
ipa: /bɑld/
rhymes: -ɔːld
homophone: balled
homophone: bawled
Forms: form: balder
form: baldest
Etymology: From Middle English balled, ballid, bald (“bald”), of uncertain origin. Probably formed from Middle English bal, balle (“ball, round object, knoll, head”). Compare Old Danish bældet (“bald”).
An alternate etymology has Old English bǣl (“fire, flame; funeral pyre”) (from Proto-Germanic *bēlą), Albanian balë (“white spot on the forehead”) and ballë (“forehead”).
Senses: examples: text: My uncle is bald.
text: The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces.
ref: 1921 June, Margery Williams, “The Velveteen Rabbit: Or How Toys Become Real”, in Harper’s Bazar, volume LVI, number 6 (2504 overall), New York, N.Y.: International Magazine Company, →ISSN, →OCLC:
text: Porn didn't revolutionize our pubic hair overnight […] but the general gist is that the vast majority of porn performers in film and magazines had full bushes until Hustler magazine printed a bald vulva, a so-called ‘pink shot’, in 1974.
ref: 2019, Lynn Enright, Vagina: A Re-Education, Atlantic Books, →ISBN:
synonyms: hairless
antonyms: faxed
haired
glosses: Having little or no hair, fur, or feathers.
examples: text: a bald man with a moustache
text: “I am getting balder and balder trying to figure these things out,” he said at an event in Washington, D.C. on Monday where he acknowledged – as he has before – that he would not run outside the Democratic party establishment.
ref: 2015 February 10, Dan Merica, quoting Bernie Sanders, “The Democratic presidential nominee that doesn’t have to be a registered Democrat”, in CNN:
text: There has never been a bald James Bond nor a hairless contestant on Love Island. Growing up, bald men were never the superheroes and always the villains.
ref: 2021 March 14, Michael Segalov, “It can leave your self-image fractured”, in The Guardian:
glosses: Having little or no hair on the head, or having a large area of bare scalp on top of the head.
glosses: Of animals, having areas (of fur or plumage) that are colored white, especially on the head.
examples: text: The bald cypress is a tree that loses its leaves in winter.
glosses: Denuded of any covering.
glosses: Of tyres: whose surface is worn away.
examples: text: Such is a bald statement of the singular and romantic series of events which centred public attention upon this Lancashire tragedy.
ref: 1922, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Black Doctor:
text: The NYSDOT, through the DSEIS, makes a bald assertion in the DSEIS, but does not explain in detail, why it feels that the Short Bypass Tunnel provides a more appropriate and respectful setting for the WTC Memorial.
ref: 1994, Route 9A Reconstruction Project, Battery Place to 59th St.:
text: Here the existential process (“there is”) functions as a bald assertion of fact, with no hedging or concessions to the observer's subjectivity, while the nominalization (“a significant role-reversal”) activates a pre-existing category from the discourse of Literary Criticism, into which the present "specimen" will be slotted.
ref: 2006, João Ferreira Duarte, Alexandra Assis Rosa, Teresa Seruya, Translation Studies at the Interface of Disciplines, →ISBN, page 115:
text: But yesterday's remarks are the baldest affirmation yet that Putin has no real intention of resigning from politics.
ref: 2007 November 14, Luke Harding, “Putin: I have a moral right to continue wielding influence”, in The Guardian:
glosses: Of a statement or account, unembellished.
examples: text: The plaintiff in this case must satisfy the judge that she has visible means, the mere bald statement that she has visible means is not suflicient.
ref: 1891, The Australian law times - Volumes 12-13, page 61:
text: The question regarding this issue is whether the applicant raised sufficient doubts regarding adoption and use of the official mark by the respondent as to have the effect that the respondent's bald assertion is not enough to provide evidence that the official mark was adopted and used or whether a negative inference should be drawn from the failure of the respondent to provide further evidence.
ref: 2001, Canadian patent reporter, page 194:
text: The Criminal Procedure Act of 1977 gives police officials the power and discretion to conduct identification procedures 'A bald statement that the accused is the person who committed the crime is not enough ... the greatest care should be taken to test the evidence.
ref: 2005, Colin Tredoux, Psychology and Law, →ISBN, page 198:
text: The EC's bald assertion of compliance in the context of this scientific and factual landscape highlights the fact that it has made no effort to demonstrate how its new import ban satisfies the conditions of a "provisional" ban under Article 5.7 of the SPS Agreement or "rationally relates" to or is "reasonably supported" by a risk assessment for purposes of Article 5.1 of the SPS Agreement.
ref: 2010, World Trade Organization, Dispute Settlement Reports 2008: Volume 11, →ISBN, page 3959:
glosses: Of a statement, without evidence or support being provided.
Derived terms: bald as a billiard ball
bald as a bladder of lard
bald as a coot
bald cap
baldchin groper
bald cypress
bald dick
bald eagle
bald earn
balden
bald erne
baldfaced
bald-faced
bald-faced hornet
baldhead
bald head
bald-headed
baldheaded
bald-headed hermit
bald-headed row
baldie
Baldilocks
balding
baldingness
baldish
baldishness
baldist
baldly
baldness
bald patch
baldpate
baldpated
bald person
baldrib
bald-shame
bald-shaming
bald spot
bald wig
baldy
like butter on a bald monkey
long-beaked bald rush
make the bald man cry
mald
malding
nonbald
piebald
semibald
skewbald
two bald men fighting over a comb