What's the difference between
and
Enter two words to compare and contrast their definitions, origins, and synonyms to better understand how those words are related.

Dull vs Brute - What's the difference?

dull | brute |

As an adjective dull

is lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp.

As a verb dull

is to render dull; to remove or blunt an edge or something that was sharp.

As a noun brute is

.

dull

English

Alternative forms

* dul, dulle

Adjective

(er)
  • Lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp.
  • :
  • Boring; not exciting or interesting.
  • :
  • :
  • Not shiny; having a matte finish or no particular luster or brightness.
  • :
  • :a dull''' fire or lamp;  a '''dull''' red or yellow;  mirror
  • *(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) (1807-1882)
  • *:As turning the logs will make a dull fire burn, so changes of study a dull brain.
  • *
  • *:A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor; as, again, the arm-chair in which Bunting now sat forward, staring into the dull , small fire. In fact, that arm-chair had been an extravagance of Mrs. Bunting. She had wanted her husband to be comfortable after the day's work was done, and she had paid thirty-seven shillings for the chair.
  • Not bright or intelligent; stupid; slow of understanding.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:She is not bred so dull but she can learn.
  • *(William Makepeace Thackeray) (1811-1863)
  • *:dull at classical learning
  • *{{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
    • , chapter=15 citation , passage=She paused and took a defiant breath. ‘If you don't believe me, I can't help it. But I'm not a liar.’ ¶ ‘No,’ said Luke, grinning at her. ‘You're not dull enough! […] What about the kid's clothes? I don't suppose they were anything to write home about, but didn't you keep anything? A bootee or a bit of embroidery or anything at all?’}}
  • Sluggish, listless.
  • *(Bible), (w) xiii. 15
  • *:This people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing.
  • *(Edmund Spenser) (c.1552–1599)
  • *:O, help my weak wit and sharpen my dull tongue.
  • *, chapter=7
    • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=[…] St.?Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of the railway viaduct, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger's mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit.}}
  • Cloudy, overcast.
  • :
  • Insensible; unfeeling.
  • *(Beaumont and Fletcher) (1603-1625)
  • *:Think me not / So dull a devil to forget the loss / Of such a matchless wife.
  • Heavy; lifeless; inert.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:the dull earth
  • *(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) (1807-1882)
  • *:As turning the logs will make a dull fire burn, so changes of study a dull brain.
  • (of pain etc) Not intense; felt indistinctly or only slightly.
    • Pressing on the bruise produces a dull pain.

    Synonyms

    * See also * See also * (not shiny) lackluster, matte

    Antonyms

    * bright * intelligent * sharp

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To render dull; to remove or blunt an edge or something that was sharp.
    • Years of misuse have dulled the tools.
  • * Francis Bacon
    • This dulled their swords.
  • To soften, moderate or blunt; to make dull, stupid, or sluggish; to stupefy.
    • He drinks to dull the pain.
  • * Shakespeare
    • Those [drugs] she has / Will stupefy and dull the sense a while.
  • * Trench
    • Use and custom have so dulled our eyes.
  • To lose a sharp edge; to become dull.
    • A razor will dull with use.
  • To render dim or obscure; to sully; to tarnish.
  • * Francis Bacon
    • dulls the mirror

    External links

    * *

    brute

    English

    (wikipedia brute)

    Adjective

    (more)
  • Without reason or intelligence (of animals).
    • a brute beast
  • Characteristic of unthinking animals; senseless, unreasoning (of humans).
  • * Milton
    • A creature not prone / And brute as other creatures, but endued / With sanctity of reason.
  • Being unconnected with intelligence or thought; purely material, senseless.
    • the brute''' earth; the '''brute powers of nature
  • Crude, unpolished.
  • * Sir Walter Scott
    • a great brute farmer from Liddesdale
  • *
  • Strong, blunt, and spontaneous.
    • I punched him with brute force.
  • Brutal; cruel; fierce; ferocious; savage; pitiless.
    • brute violence

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • * 1714 , (Bernard Mandeville), The Fable of the Bees :
    • they laid before them how unbecoming it was the Dignity of such sublime Creatures to be sollicitous about gratifying those Appetites, which they had in common with Brutes , and at the same time unmindful of those higher qualities that gave them the preeminence over all visible Beings.
  • * 1946 , (Bertrand Russell), History of Western Philosophy , I.17:
    • But if he lives badly, he will, in the next life, be a woman; if he (or she) persists in evil-doing, he (or she) will become a brute , and go on through transmigrations until at last reason conquers.
  • A person with the characteristics of an unthinking animal; a coarse or brutal person.
    • One of them was a hulking brute of a man, heavily tattooed and with a hardened face that practically screamed "I just got out of jail."
  • *
    • She was frankly disappointed. For some reason she had thought to discover a burglar of one or another accepted type—either a dashing cracksman in full-blown evening dress, lithe, polished, pantherish, or a common yegg, a red-eyed, unshaven burly brute in the rags and tatters of a tramp.
  • (archaic, slang, UK, Cambridge University) One who has not yet matriculated.

    • Derived terms

    * brutal * brutality * brute force * brutish

    Verb

    (brut)

    • Anagrams

    * ----