Definitions for bristles

• Definition
• Anagrams (305)

bristles bris·tle

Spelling: [bris-uh l]

IPA: /ˈbrɪs əl/

Bristles is a 8 letter English word. It's valid Scrabble word worth 9 points. It's valid Words with friends word worth 11 points.

You can make 305 anagrams from letters in bristles (beilrsst).

Definitions for bristles

noun

1. one of the short, stiff, coarse hairs of certain animals, especially hogs, used extensively in making brushes.
2. anything resembling these hairs.

verb (used with object)

1. to erect like bristles:
2. to furnish with a bristle or bristles.
3. to make bristly.

verb (used without object)

1. to stand or rise stiffly, like bristles.
2. to erect the bristles, as an irritated animal (often followed by up):
3. to become rigid with anger or irritation:
4. to be thickly set or filled with something suggestive of bristles:
5. to be visibly roused or stirred (usually followed by up).

Origin of bristles

before 1000; Middle English bristel, equivalent to brist (Old English byrst bristle, cognate with German Borste, Old Norse burst) + -el diminutive suffix

Examples for bristles

Pete bristled—as much as a fat man could bristle on so hot a day.

In fact, so complete was his recovery, he later allowed himself to bristle at comparisons with Spitzer.

And they bristle too at the notion that they had some kind of personal enmity toward the president.

Of course there are those who bristle at such neologisms—the scolds, the conservative prescriptivists, the SNOOTs.

How was he to know that this thing that sniffed was a thing at which to bristle?

Americans tend to bristle even at self-censorship; we are reluctant to declare that we simply are not going to look at something.

Republicans, meanwhile, bristle with anger as they attempt to defend against the flood of new information.

The whole place, behind the fence, appeared to bristle and resound.

The mane on his back began to bristle, and I knew that I had but a small second in which to act.

Hill began to bristle and to look around in search of the one who had spoken.