bellied

bellied

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɛlid/

Adjective

bellied (not comparable)

1. Having a large or prominent belly.
   • 1932, Rudyard Kipling, “Dayspring Mishandled” in Limits and Renewals,

     There was, also, among the company a mannered, bellied person called Alured Castorley […]

2. (in combination) Having a belly of a specified type.
   • 1997, Alejandro Grattan-Domínguez, Breaking even

     But one guy was still yelping: a big-bellied biker, with a long, black beard that hung halfway down his bloated gut.

3. Swollen, bulging, or billowing; bellying.
   • 1819, Joseph Rodman Drake, “The American Flag” in The Culprit Fay, and Other Poems, New York: Van Norden & King, 1847, p. 91,

     Flag of the seas! on ocean wave

     Thy stars shall glitter o’er the brave;

     When death, careering on the gale,

     Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail,

   • 1857, Alexander Smith, “A Boy’s Poem” in City Poems, Boston: Ticknor & Fields, pp. 98-99,

     We heard the swarming streets, the noisy mills;

     Saw sooty foundries full of glare and gloom,

     Great bellied chimneys tipped with tongues of flame,

     Quiver in smoky heat.

   • 1883, George Meredith, “Phoebus with Admetus” in Poems and Lyrics of the Joy of the Earth, London: Macmillan, p. 74,

     Hand-like rushed the vintage; we strung the bellied skins

     Plump, and at the sealing the Youth’s voice rose:

4. (figuratively) Overblown, exaggerated.
   • c. 1610, Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, Philaster, Act I, Scene 1,

     […] the choicest of his friends,

     Such as would blush to talk such serious follies,

     Or back such bellied commendations […]

Derived terms

• bare-bellied Joe
• barrel-bellied
• beer-bellied
• black-bellied plover
• black-bellied sandgrouse
• fire-bellied toad
• fish-bellied
• potbellied, pot-bellied
• rufous-bellied kookaburra
• white-bellied nothura
• yellow-bellied
• yellow-bellied sapsucker

 

Verb

bellied

1. simple past tense and past participle of belly

Anagrams

• delible, libeled