Adjacent Words

Brittle definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

BRIT'TLE, a. [Heb. to part, to break. See Part.]
Easily broken or easily breaking short, without splinters or loose parts rent from the substance; fragile; not tough or tenacious; as brittle stone or glass.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: having little elasticity; hence easily cracked or fractured or snapped; "brittle bones"; "glass is brittle"; "`brickle' and `brickly' are dialectal" [syn: brittle, brickle, brickly]
2: lacking warmth and generosity of spirit; "a brittle and calculating woman"
3: (of metal or glass) not annealed and consequently easily cracked or fractured [syn: brittle, unannealed] n
1: caramelized sugar cooled in thin sheets [syn: brittle, toffee, toffy]

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective (brittler; brittlest) Etymology: Middle English britil; akin to Old English br?otan to break, Old Norse brj?ta Date: 14th century 1. a. easily broken, cracked, or snapped <brittle clay> <brittle glass> b. easily disrupted, overthrown, or damaged ; frail <a brittle friendship> 2. a. perishable, mortal b. transitory, evanescent 3. easily hurt or offended ; sensitive <a brittle personality> 4. sharp <the brittle staccato of snare drums> 5. lacking warmth, depth, or generosity of spirit ; cold <a brittle selfish person> 6. affected with or being a form of type 1 diabetes characterized by large and unpredictable fluctuations in blood glucose level Synonyms: see fragile • brittlely adverb • brittleness noun II. noun Date: 1913 a candy made with caramelized sugar and nuts spread in thin sheets <peanut brittle>

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. & n. --adj. hard and fragile; apt to break. --n. a brittle sweet made from nuts and set melted sugar. Phrases and idioms: brittle-bone disease = OSTEOPOROSIS. brittle-star an echinoderm of the class Ophiuroidea, with long brittle arms radiating from a small central body. Derivatives: brittlely adv. brittleness n. brittly adv. Etymology: ME ult. f. a Gmc root rel. to OE breotan break up

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Brittle Brit"tle, a. [OE. britel, brutel, AS. bryttian to dispense, fr. bre['o]tan to break; akin to Icel. brytja, Sw. bryta, Dan. bryde. Cf. Brickle.] Easily broken; apt to break; fragile; not tough or tenacious

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. An object or substance that is brittle is hard but easily broken. Pine is brittle and breaks. ...the dry, brittle ends of the hair. ADJ 2. If you describe a situation, relationship, or someone's mood as brittle, you mean that it is unstable, and may easily change. These incidents suggest the peace in Northern Ireland is still brittle... = fragile ADJ

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. Fragile, crumbling, shivery, frail, frangible, brash, easily broken (into pieces), easily shivered.

Moby Thesaurus

atrophied, breakable, brittle as glass, capricious, changeable, cheap-jack, cobwebby, corruptible, crackable, crisp, crispy, crumbly, crump, crushable, dainty, deciduous, delicate, delicately weak, desiccated, dried-up, dying, effeminate, emaciated, ephemeral, evanescent, fading, fickle, fissile, fleeting, flimsy, flitting, fly-by-night, flying, fracturable, fragile, frail, frangible, friable, fugacious, fugitive, gimcrack, gimcracky, gossamery, impermanent, impetuous, impulsive, inconstant, insecure, insubstantial, jerry, jerry-built, lacerable, light, lightweight, momentary, mortal, mutable, namby-pamby, nondurable, nonpermanent, papery, parchmenty, passing, pasteboardy, perishable, puny, scissile, sensitive, sere, shatterable, shattery, shivery, short-lived, shriveled, shrunken, sissified, sleazy, slight, splintery, tacky, temporal, temporary, transient, transitive, transitory, undurable, unenduring, unstable, unsubstantial, volatile, vulnerable, wasted, weak, wilted, wispy, withered, wizened, womanish, wrinkled