befoul, v.
(bɪˈfaʊl)
[f. be- 5 + foul: a later formation, which ran parallel to befile in ME., and at length displaced it.]
trans. To make foul, cover with filth or dirt; often of moral filth; esp. in the proverbial to befoul one's own nest.
| c 1320 Cast. Love 1147 Al was his face bi-foulet w{supt} spot. c 1430 Syr Gener. 4610 The last he fond Darel Al be⁓fouled in the grauel. 1526 Skelton Magnyf. 885, I befoule his pate. 1726 Amherst Terræ Fil. v. 22 'Tis an ill bird which befouls his own nest. 1844 Macaulay Chatham, Ess., Fox had stumbled in the mire, and had not only been defeated but befouled. |
Hence beˈfouler, beˈfoulment.
| 1842 Ld. Jeffrey in Napier's Corr. (1879) 388 A befouler of his own nest. 1862 F. Hall Hind. Philos. Syst. 272 The ignorant..think the blueness of the sky to be the befoulment of ether. |