Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use belie in a sentence

24 example sentences · verb

Belie means to lie around; encompass. Example: “Her smooth complexion and dark hair belie her actual age.”

Examples of belie by meaning

verbTo give a false representation of.

  • Her smooth complexion and dark hair belie her actual age.
  • Cambodia's apparent relative insignificance belied its geopolitical importance.2013 April 3, Patrick Heenan, The Southeast Asia Handbook, Taylor & Francis, →ISBN, page 132
  • Opposite, the Loram site contains a real ragbag of yellow, blue or rust-streaked kit whose appearance belies their importance in keeping the railways running.2020 November 18, Paul Bigland, “New infrastructure and new rolling stock”, in Rail, page 49

verbTo contradict, to show (something) to be false.

  • Her obvious nervousness belied what she said.
  • This fact belies the earlier myth that would have us believe that kesar was not known prior to Lalitaditya's reign.2001, Arun Kaul, “Kesar: The cultural geography of Kashmir”, in The Human Landscape, page 227
  • In smooth RP tones that belie his German parentage, he explains that none of his hachet jobs were written out of personal animosity.2016 April 9, Philip Oltermann, “Michael Hofmann: ‘English is basically a trap. It’s almost a language for spies’”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

verbTo fill with lies; to lie to.

  • Three belied you, three betrayed you!2002 May 1, Bethesda Softworks, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, →OCLC, Microsoft Windows, scene: Ashlander Informant

verbTo conceal the contradictory or ironic presence of (something).

  • His calm demeanor belied his inner sense of guilt.
  • The rosy outlook belies a struggle to achieve statewide eradication that has persisted since the insect first crossed the border from Mexico around 1892.2013 August 31, Elizabeth Koh, “Fighting Pest, Farmers Find Strange Ally: A Drought”, in New York Times
  • At NIE the virtually monolingual linguistic landscape basically belies a quite different multilingual reality.2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual...

verbTo show, evince or demonstrate (something) to be present, particularly something deemed contradictory or ironic.

  • A host of evidence is adduced by the accused, evidence whose sometimes self-contradictory nature belies a certain desperation1993, Carol A. Mossman, Politics and Narratives of Birth: Gynocolonization from Rousseau to Zola, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 28

More sentences with belie

  • His ashen face belied his claims of good health.From the entry ashen
  • Her boyish figure belied her femininity.From the entry boyish
  • Edwardianism was thought to favour continuity and tradition, but the fiction often belies this.2008, C. Etherington-Wright, Gender, Professions and Discourse. From the entry Edwardianism
  • This most religious of art forms belies the pathetic empiricisms of contemporary discussions.2001 Sep, Mark Zimmermann, “The Stillness of Painting: Robert Kingston and His Contemporaries”, in PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art…. From the entry empiricism
  • Rimsky invests them with a sort of Dostoevskyian tragic air that belies the author’s characterizations.1933, The Book Collector’s Packet, volume 2, page 12, column 2. From the entry Dostoevskyian
  • Like Silenus, the comically monstrous box contained good advice and wisdom, its drunken exterior belying its profound interior.2016, Joseph Campana, Renaissance Posthumanism, page 101. From the entry silenic
  • A peely-paint old porch chair and a vintage clock are other relics that seem to belie the advance of time.1999, Sally Clark, House Beautiful: Bathrooms, New York, N.Y.: Hearst Books, →ISBN, page 57. From the entry peely
  • The hopes of Valignano were not belied.1957, Jerome D'Souza, “Giants of Asia”, in Thomas J. M. Burke, editor, Beyond All Horizons: Jesuits and the Missions, Garden City, New…. From the entry Shiuhing
  • Her pretty face, volumptuous body, and ultra feminine mannerisms belie her intellect, which makes her doubly gifted in the world of fashion and career.2018, Marie Woodruff, So You Want to Be a Haute Couture Fashionista?, →ISBN, page 19. From the entry volumptuous
  • When he'd come back, his red eyes and hempish aroma belied an addiction that neither he nor his mother wanted to acknowledge.2014, Pamela Donnelly, 4 Keys to College Admissions Success. From the entry hempish
  • Sacks that she identifies with Data, an android on "Star Trek" whose emotionlessness belies a great curiosity and wistfulness about the human world.1995 February 14, Michiko Kakutani, “BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Finding the Advantages In Some Mind Disorders”, in The New York Times. From the entry emotionlessness
  • The description was patently transparent: not only did it hint broadly to nongays, but it also belied the truth of Isherwood and Bachardy's off-and-on living situation.1988 February 5, Achy Obejas, “The Press: Averting Our Gays”, in Chicago Reader. From the entry nongay
  • We do get to see another side of Rhys, which is nowhere evident in the fiction — a dreary, work-like attitude which belies the faded, expiring tone of the novels.1985 February 2, Tim Broadbent, “Kindred Spirits (review)”, in Gay Community News, volume 12, number 28, page 10. From the entry worklike

Meaning of belie

  1. verb To lie around; encompass.
  2. verb To surround; beleaguer.
  3. verb To tell lies about.

Full definition of belie

Questions about belie in a sentence

How do you use belie in a sentence?
Belie is used as a verb. For example: “Her smooth complexion and dark hair belie her actual age.”
What is a short sentence with belie?
“Her boyish figure belied her femininity.”
What does belie mean?
Belie means to lie around; encompass.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: belie (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use belie in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/belie. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.