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🇫🇷French Source WordCode: FR

bête

Pronunciation / Transliteration: bɛt

🇬🇧 Direct English Meaning:
Thickheaded/ˈθɪkˌhɛd.ɪd/
adjectiveCEFR C1 (Advanced)Top #28500 frequency
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🇫🇷 Example Sentence in French:

"Il est trop bête pour comprendre la situation."

Comprehensive Definitions & Senses

2 senses
As adjective
  1. 1

    Having a dull intellect; slow to understand, learn, or comprehend things.

    "He was too thickheaded to grasp the simple instructions for assembling the machine."
  2. 2

    Stubbornly obstinate or pigheaded in one's opinions or actions.

    "Her thickheaded refusal to listen to advice cost the team the entire project."
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Antonyms & Contrasting Words (1)

Linguistic Origin & Historical Etymology

Derived from the combination of the adjectives 'thick' (used figuratively since the 16th century to imply dullness of mind) and 'headed' (having a head of a specified kind). The compound emerged in early modern English to describe someone whose mental capacity is sluggish or obtuse, metaphorically possessing a skull too dense for ideas to easily penetrate.

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