Word.ws English Dictionary

brash

/ˈbɹæʃ/

brash adjective: overly bold or self-assertive to the point of being insensitive, tactless or impudent; shameless.

Adjective (1)

brash (comparative brasher or more brash, superlative brashest or most brash)

  1. Overly bold or self-assertive to the point of being insensitive, tactless or impudent; shameless.
    • a brash young businessman; a brash tabloid; a brash sense of humour
    • Mrs. Mayfield looked away, and the girl stricken with remorse, hastened to her and said: “There, I have been too brash, haven’t I? You must forgive me for I didn’t intend to be brash.”
    • “Brash, my dear? What do you mean by that?”
    • She laughed. “Why, I thought everybody know’d what brash meant. Well, it’s er—too quick to say somethin’ you oughtn’t to say.”1902, Opie Read, The Starbucks, Chicago: Laird & Lee, Chapter, page 210
  2. Overly bold, impetuous or rash.
    • […] just because you’re a little hot under the collar, don’t do anything brash, for fear you may regret it afterward.1905, Andy Adams, chapter 2, in The Outlet, Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, page 22
    • Now, Mr. Reed, you’ve committed nothing but a brash act of bad taste by bypassing the standard channels.1960 April, George O. Smith, “The Troublemakers”, in Galaxy Science Fiction, volume 18, number 4, page 156
    Synonyms:
    foolhardy, reckless
  3. Bold, bright or showy, often in a tasteless way.
    • brash colours
    • a brash perfume

Noun (1)

brash (countable and uncountable, plural brashes)

  1. A rash or eruption; a sudden or transient fit of sickness.
  2. A sudden burst of rain.
  3. (obsolete) An attack or assault.

Verb

brash (third-person singular simple present brashes, present participle brashing, simple past and past participle brashed)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To disturb.

Adjective (2)

brash (comparative brasher or more brash, superlative brashest or most brash)

  1. (US, colloquial, dated) Brittle (said e.g. of wood or vegetables).
    • Hickory axles […] all cut from tough butt logs. Brash timber is excluded.1886, The Lumberman's Hand Book, page 24
    • Brash wood, when tested in bending, breaks with a short, sharp fracture instead of developing a splintering failure and absorbs a comparatively small amount of work between the elastic limit and final failure1919, Forest Products Laboratory, Wood in Aircraft Construction

Noun (2)

brash (countable and uncountable, plural brashes)

  1. Leaf litter of small leaves and little twigs as found under a hedge.
  2. Broken and angular rock fragments underlying alluvial deposits.
    • Alluvium differs from the rubble or brash, just described, as being composed of sand and gravel, more or less rolled1839, Sir Charles Lyell, Elements of Geology
  3. Broken fragments of ice.
    • The sea dashed in an angry surf over its inclined sides, rattling the icy fragments or “brash” against its irregular surface1853, Elisha Kent Kane, The U. S. Grinnell Expedition in Search of Sir John Franklin

Proper noun capitalized: Brash

Brash (plural Brashes)

  1. A surname.

brash meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

brash in Tamil

புளியேப்பம், கப்பிக்கல், உடைந்த பனிக்கூடித்துண்டு

brash in Urdu

بےحیا, بےشرم, گستاخ

brash in Malayalam

self-assertive, self-confident, pushy
സാഹസിയായ, എടുത്തുചാട്ടമുള്ള, അമിത ആത്മവിശ്വാസമുള്ള, സ്വയം മുന്നേറ്റുന്ന, അമിതമായി ആത്മവിശ്വാസമുള്ള, ധൃഷ്ണക്ക്
gaudy, garish, loud
പകിട്ടു കാട്ടുന്ന, പുറംപകിട്ടുള്ള, വിലകുറഞ്ഞ തിളക്കമേറിയ, അഭംഗിതോന്നും വിധം കണ്ണഞ്ചുന്ന, വല്ലാതെ തിളങ്ങുന്ന, കടുത്തനിറമുള്ള

brash in Kannada

ದುಡುಕಿನ
More languagesFewer languages
brash in Persian
گستاخ gostâx

Examples of brash in a sentence

  • Trouble with Silzer is, he’s too brash—shoots off his mouth too much—likes to hear himself talk.1925, Sinclair Lewis, chapter 17, in Arrowsmith:
  • The American’s brash unconcern for nuance indicates a young and vigorous country, the Briton’s clipped speech an ancient, proverbial reserve.1958, Peter De Vries, chapter 14, in Mackerel Plaza, Penguin, published 1986, page 209:
  • Sadly, by the 1970s the arcade had gone downmarket with brash shop fronts and cheap shops, some of doubtful reputation.2021 December 15, Robin Leleux, “Awards honour the best restoration projects: The Great Western Railway Craft Skills Award: Victoria...
  • […] brash timber, which is liable to snap; […]2000, Jean-Nicolas-Louis Durand, Précis of the Lectures on Architecture (page 94)

All 22 example sentences with brash

Synonyms of brash

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of brash

Forms of brash

Adjective
comparativebrasher
comparativemore brash
superlativebrashest
superlativemost brash
Noun
pluralbrashes
Verb
third-person singular presentbrashes
present participlebrashing
past participlebrashed
pastbrashed
Proper noun
pluralBrashes

Origin of brash

Uncertain. Perhaps from Scots brash, brasch (“a violent onset; an attack or assault”). Perhaps also related to Dutch bars (“stern; strict”), German barsch (“harsh; unfriendly”), Danish barsk (“harsh; rough; tough”), Swedish barsk (“harsh; impetuous”).

Compare American English bresk, brusk (“fragile, brittle”).

Two main origins: * Scottish surname; probably from brash, a nickname for an impetuous person. * Americanized spelling of German Braasch.

Words formed from brash

Words that rhyme with brash

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about brash

What does brash mean?
Brash means overly bold or self-assertive to the point of being insensitive, tactless or impudent; shameless.
What is brash in Tamil?
Brash in Tamil is புளியேப்பம், கப்பிக்கல், உடைந்த பனிக்கூடித்துண்டு. See Brash meaning in Tamil.
How do you use brash in a sentence?
Trouble with Silzer is, he’s too brash—shoots off his mouth too much—likes to hear himself talk.
What part of speech is brash?
Brash can be an adjective, a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce brash?
Brash is pronounced /ˈbɹæʃ/.

Words near brash in the dictionary

  1. Brases
  2. Braseth
  3. Braseths
  4. Brasfield
  5. Brasfields
  6. brash
  7. brash ice
  8. Brashear
  9. Brashears
  10. brashed
  11. brasher

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: brash (page history and authors); Brash (page history and authors); brash (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); brash (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); brash (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); brash (Kannada Wiktionary) (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:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-brash.wav.

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