Word.ws English Dictionary

hebete

US/ˈhiːbiːt/

hebete adjective: unintelligent; stupid.

Adjective

hebete (comparative more hebete, superlative most hebete)

  1. (obsolete) unintelligent; stupid.
    • the most hebete of created intelligences1856, Marion Harland, Alone

Forms of hebete

comparativemore hebete
superlativemost hebete

Origin of hebete

Learned borrowing from Latin hebes, hebetis (“dull, stupid”), from hebere (“to be dull”).

Questions about hebete

What does hebete mean?
Hebete means unintelligent; stupid.
What part of speech is hebete?
Hebete is an adjective.
How do you pronounce hebete?
Hebete is pronounced /ˈhiːbiːt/ (US).

Words near hebete in the dictionary

  1. hebetate
  2. hebetated
  3. hebetates
  4. hebetating
  5. hebetation
  6. hebete
  7. hebetic
  8. hebetude
  9. hebetudes
  10. hebetudinosity
  11. hebetudinous

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hebete (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:

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