Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Bleak

Bleak (blēk), a. [OE. blac, bleyke, bleche, AS. blāc, blǣc, pale, wan; akin to Icel. bleikr, Sw. blek, Dan. bleg, OS. blēk, D. bleek, OHG. pleih, G. bleich; all from the root of AS. blīcan to shine; akin to OHG. blīchen to shine; cf. L. flagrare to burn, Gr. φλέγειν to burn, shine, Skr. bhrāj to shine, and E. flame. √98. Cf. Bleach, Blink, Flame.] 1. Without color; pale; pallid. [Obs.]

When she came out she looked as pale and as bleak as one that were laid out dead. Foxe.

2. Desolate and exposed; swept by cold winds.

Wastes too bleak to rear The common growth of earth, the foodful ear. Wordsworth.

At daybreak, on the bleak sea beach. Longfellow.

3. Cold and cutting; cheerless; as, a bleak blast.

— Bleak′ish, a. — Bleak′ly, adv. — Bleak′ness, n.

Bleak, n. [From Bleak, a., cf. Blay.] (Zoöl.) A small European river fish (Leuciscus alburnus), of the family Cyprinidæ; the blay. [Written also blick.]

☞ The silvery pigment lining the scales of the bleak is used in the manufacture of artificial pearls. Baird.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.