Dull vs Hard - What's the difference?
dull | hard | Related terms |
Lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp.
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Boring; not exciting or interesting.
:
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Not shiny; having a matte finish or no particular luster or brightness.
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: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 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= Cloudy, overcast.
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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.
To render dull; to remove or blunt an edge or something that was sharp.
* Francis Bacon
To soften, moderate or blunt; to make dull, stupid, or sluggish; to stupefy.
* Shakespeare
* Trench
To lose a sharp edge; to become dull.
To render dim or obscure; to sully; to tarnish.
* Francis Bacon
(label) Having a severe property; presenting difficulty.
# Resistant to pressure.
# (label) Strong.
# (label) High in dissolved calcium compounds.
# Having the capability of being a permanent magnet by being a material with high magnetic coercivity (compare soft).
(label) Having a severe property; presenting difficulty.
# Requiring a lot of effort to do or understand.
#* 1988 , An Oracle , Edmund White
#*{{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-26, author=
, volume=189, issue=7, page=32, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly)
, title= # Demanding a lot of effort to endure.
# Severe, harsh, unfriendly, brutal.
# (label) Difficult to resist or control; powerful.
#* (w, Roger L'Estrange) (1616-1704)
#* (Joseph Addison) (1672-1719)
Unquestionable.
* {{quote-news, year=2011, date=December 19, author=Kerry Brown, work=The Guardian
, title= (label) Having a comparatively larger or a ninety-degree angle.
Sexually aroused.
(label) Having muscles that are tightened as a result of intense, regular exercise.
(label)
# Plosive.
# Unvoiced
(label) Having a severe property; presenting a barrier to enjoyment.
# Rigid in the drawing or distribution of the figures; formal; lacking grace of composition.
# Having disagreeable and abrupt contrasts in colour or shading.
(label) In the form of a hard copy.
(manner) With much force or effort.
* Dryden
* Shakespeare
*
(manner) With difficulty.
(obsolete) So as to raise difficulties.
* Sir Thomas Browne
(manner) Compactly.
Near, close.
* Bible, Acts xviii. 7
* 1999 , (George RR Martin), A Clash of Kings , Bantam 2011, p. 418:
(nautical) A firm or paved beach or slope convenient for hauling vessels out of the water
Dull is a related term of hard.
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 hard is
stove, heater; an enclosed space in which fuel (usually wood) is burned to provide heating, usually for cooking.dull
English
Alternative forms
* dul, dulleAdjective
(er)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?’}}
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.}}
- Pressing on the bruise produces a dull pain.
Synonyms
* See also * See also * (not shiny) lackluster, matteAntonyms
* bright * intelligent * sharpVerb
(en verb)- Years of misuse have dulled the tools.
- This dulled their swords.
- He drinks to dull the pain.
- Those [drugs] she has / Will stupefy and dull the sense a while.
- Use and custom have so dulled our eyes.
- A razor will dull with use.
- dulls the mirror
External links
* *hard
English
Adjective
(er)- Ray found it hard to imagine having accumulated so many mannerisms before the dawn of sex, of the sexual need to please, of the staginess sex encourages or the tightly capped wells of poisoned sexual desire the disappointed must stand guard over.
Nick Miroff
Mexico gets a taste for eating insects […], passage=The San Juan market is Mexico City's most famous deli of exotic meats, where an adventurous shopper can hunt down hard -to-find critters such as ostrich, wild boar and crocodile.}}
- The stag was too hard for the horse.
- a power which will be always too hard for them
Kim Jong-il obituary, passage=Unsurprisingly for a man who went into mourning for three years after the death in 1994 of his own father, the legendary leader Kim Il-sung, and who in the first 30 years of his political career made no public statements, even to his own people, Kim's career is riddled with claims, counter claims, speculation, and contradiction. There are few hard facts about his birth and early years. }}
- Hard' ''k'', ''t'', ''s'', ''ch'', as distinguished from '''soft , ''g'', ''d'', ''z'', ''j
- We need both a digital archive and a hard archive.
Synonyms
* (resistant to pressure ): resistant, solid, stony * (requiring a lot of effort to do or understand ): confusing, difficult, puzzling, tough, tricky * (requiring a lot of effort to endure ): difficult, intolerable, tough, unbearable * (severe ): harsh, hostile, severe, strict, tough, unfriendly * (unquestionable ): incontrovertible, indubitable, unambiguous, unequivocal, unquestionable * (of drink ): strong * See alsoAntonyms
* (resistant to pressure ): soft * (requiring a lot of effort to do or understand ): easy, simple, straightforward, trite * (requiring a lot of effort to endure ): bearable, easy * (severe ): agreeable, amiable, approachable, friendly, nice, pleasant * (unquestionable ): controvertible, doubtful, ambiguous, equivocal, questionable * (of drink ): ** (low in alcohol ): low-alcohol ** (non-alcoholic ): alcohol-free, soft, non-alcoholic * (of roads) soft * ("sexually aroused"): soft, flaccidDerived terms
* between a rock and a hard place * die-hard * hard as nails * hard-ass * hardboard * hard-boiled * hard by * hard candy * hard case * hard cheese * hard-coded * hard copy * hardcore * hard disk/hard disc * hard done by * hard drink * hard-edged * harden * hard feelings * hard grass * hard hat * hard head * hard-hearted * hard-hitting * hard knocks * hard labor * hard light * hard-liner * hard lines * hard luck * hardness * hard news * hard-on * hard-pressed * hard radiation * hard sauce * hard science fiction * hard-shell * hard times * hard to come by * hard to please * hard up * hardware * hard water * hard-wire * hardwood * hard work * have it hard * play hard to get * (hard)Adverb
(er)- He hit the puck hard up the ice.
- They worked hard all week.
- At the intersection, bear hard left.
- The recession hit them especially hard .
- Think hard about your choices.
- prayed so hard for mercy from the prince
- My father / Is hard at study; pray now, rest yourself.
- His degree was hard earned.
- The vehicle moves hard .
- The question is hard set.
- The lake had finally frozen hard .
- whose house joined hard to the synagogue
- It was another long day's march before they glimpsed the towers of Harrenhal in the distance, hard beside the blue waters of the lake.