bedizen, v.
(bɪˈdaɪz(ə)n, -ˈdɪz(ə)n)
Also bedizzen.
[f. be- + dizen. All English orthoepists have (aɪ); Webster has the alternative (ɪ).]
trans. To dress out, especially in a vulgar or gaudy fashion.
| 1661 K. W. Conf. Charac. (1860) 81 These petty ladies..are bedizned in sable sacks, or..in white sarcenet wallats. 1755 Johnson, Bedizen, to dress out: a low word. a 1779 Langhorne County Just. (R.) Ye cits, that sore bedizen Nature's face. 1825 Scott Talism. (1854) 267 You have bedizened me in green, a colour he detests. |
b. fig.
| a 1788 Headley Parod. Gray's El. (T.) The name bedizen'd by the pedant muse. 1806 Edin. Rev. VIII. 268 The quotations..with which Mr. Lemaistre has thought fit to bedizzen his pages. 1820 W. Irving Sketch Bk. II. 130 Bedizened out into a burlesque imitation of an antique masque. |