bemean

/bɪˈmiːn/

bemean verb: to mean; signify; inform.

Verb (1)

bemean (third-person singular simple present bemeans, present participle bemeaning, simple past and past participle bemeant)

(obsolete, transitive) To mean; signify; inform.

Verb (2)

bemean (third-person singular simple present bemeans, present participle bemeaning, simple past and past participle bemeaned)

To make mean or base, demean.
- I fished carefully, used wet flies and dry, all that I had in my book, and even bemeaned myself by baiting a plain hook with a grasshopper.1973, Alfred Bertram Guthrie, Wild Pitch (Fiction), G. K. Hall, →ISBN, page 85
Synonyms:

demean

Synonyms of bemean

demean

Forms of bemean

third-person singular present	bemeans
present participle	bemeaning
past participle	bemeant
past	bemeant
alternative form	bemene
past participle	bemeaned
past	bemeaned

Origin of bemean

From Middle English bemenen, equivalent to be- + mean (“to signify”). Compare Middle High German bemeinen (“to mean”).

From be- + mean (“base, lowly”), from Middle English mene, aphetic variation of Middle English imene (“average, lowly, mean”), from Old English ġemǣne (“mean, common, average”). More at mean.

Words that rhyme with bemean

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about bemean

What does bemean mean?: Bemean means to mean; signify; inform.
What part of speech is bemean?: Bemean is a verb.
How do you pronounce bemean?: Bemean is pronounced /bɪˈmiːn/.
What is the past tense of bemean?: The past tense of bemean is bemeant.

Words near bemean in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: bemean (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “bemean.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bemean. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.