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Blate

//bleɪt// adj, verb

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    Bashful, sheepish. Northern-England, Scotland

    "You'd say Not them; fine legs, and Ma struggling into her blouse would say You're no blate. Who told you they're fine?"

  2. 2
    Dull, stupid. Northern-England, Scotland
Adjective
  1. 1
    disposed to avoid notice wordnet
Verb
  1. 1
    Archaic form of bleat. alt-of, archaic

    "Away they fly, like a party of Indians after buffaloes; while along the road, it may be, cattle are bellowing, sheep blating, dogs barking, hens cackling, and crows cawing."

  2. 2
    cry plaintively wordnet

Etymology

Borrowed from Scots blate (“timid, sheepish”), apparently a conflation of: * Northern Middle English *blate, *blait (“pale, ghastly, terrified”), from Old English blāt (“pale, livid, ghastly”), from Proto-West Germanic *blait (“pale, discoloured”), from Proto-Germanic *blaitaz, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleyd- (“pale, pallid”); * Middle English bleth, bleath (“timid, soft”), from Old English blēaþ (“gentle, shy, cowardly, timid; slothful, inactive, effeminate”), from Proto-Germanic *blauþuz (“weak, timid, void, naked”). Cognate with German blassen (“to make pale”), bleich (“pale, pallid”). More at bleak, bleach.

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