dishevelled
pronunciation
How to pronounce dishevelled in British English:
UK [dɪˈʃevld]
How to pronounce dishevelled in American English:
US [dɪˈʃɛvəld]
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- Adjective:
- in disarray; extremely disorderly
Word Origin
- dishevelled
- dishevelled: [15] Semantically, dishevelled ‘with untidy hair’ and unkempt ‘with uncombed hair’ are closely parallel formations. Dishevelled originated as an adaptation of deschevele, the past participle of Old French descheveler ‘disarrange the hair’. This was a compound verb formed from the prefix dis- ‘apart’ and chevel ‘hair’, a descendant of Latin capillus ‘hair’ (from which English got capillary [17]).In Middle English its meaning was extended to ‘without a head-dress’, and even to ‘undressed’, but its modern metaphorical application is the more general ‘untidy’. (The verb dishevel was a late 16th-century back-formation from dishevelled.)=> capillary
Example
- 1. I landed in a dishevelled heap on the wet grass .
- 2. In the morning mirror you grieve at your dishevelled hair .
- 3. Pansy 's a little dusty , a little dishevelled .
- 4. Page and brin are pleasantly dishevelled workaholics who find it amazing that they don 't have to subsist on burritos .
- 5. Standing up , he saw his mother gazing at him from under her dishevelled white hair .