brindle
adjective
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L335034 on Wikidata ↗Wiktionary
adj
Etymology: Back-formation from brindled, a variant of brinded (“streaked, spotted”), apparently reanalyzed as brindle + -ed. Attested from the late seventeenth century.
- Having such a colouration; brindled.
“It is brindle. Stripes of black and brown ride its ribs like a zebra’s.”
name
Etymology: From Old English burna (“stream, brook”) + hyll (“hill”). The surname could either derive from the village in England or be an Americanized spelling of South German Brindl and Bründl.
- A small village and civil parish in Chorley borough, Lancashire, England (OS grid ref SD5924).
- A surname.
noun
Etymology: Back-formation from brindled, a variant of brinded (“streaked, spotted”), apparently reanalyzed as brindle + -ed. Attested from the late seventeenth century.
- A streaky colouration in animals.
- An animal so coloured.
“I snatch at the puppy closest to me, the brindle, which is limp in my hand, and shove it down my shirt.”
verb
Etymology: Back-formation from brindled, a variant of brinded (“streaked, spotted”), apparently reanalyzed as brindle + -ed. Attested from the late seventeenth century.
- To form streaks of a different color.
“Sorely too as I laboured and toiled, the reward of toil would not come ; already my back began to curve, and my hair to brindle itself with gray, yet I saw no luck before me.”
“It is the perfect opposition of dark and light that brindles the tiger with gold flame and dark flame.”