Word.ws English Dictionary

imbarrass

imbarrass is the obsolete form of embarrass.

Meaning of embarrass

Verb

embarrass (third-person singular simple present embarrasses, present participle embarrassing, simple past and past participle embarrassed)

  1. (transitive) To disrupt someone's composure or comfort with acting publicly or freely.
    • The crowd's laughter and jeers embarrassed him.
  2. (transitive) To hinder from liberty of movement; to impede; to obstruct.
    • The motion was advanced in order to embarrass the progress of the bill.
  3. (transitive) To involve in difficulties concerning money matters; to encumber with debt; to beset with urgent claims or demands.
    • A man or his business is embarrassed when he cannot meet his pecuniary engagements.
  4. (formal, transitive) To perplex mentally; confuse, disconcert; catch off guard.

See all 9 meanings of embarrass

Forms of imbarrass

third-person singular presentimbarrasses
present participleimbarrassing
past participleimbarrassed
pastimbarrassed

Words formed from imbarrass

Questions about imbarrass

What is imbarrass the obsolete form of?
Imbarrass is the obsolete form of embarrass.

Words near imbarrass in the dictionary

  1. imbarks
  2. imbarn
  3. imbarned
  4. imbarning
  5. imbarns
  6. imbarrass
  7. imbarrassment
  8. imbarrassments
  9. imbarred
  10. imbarring
  11. imbars

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: imbarrass (page history and authors); embarrass (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.

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