Navigation
Home
Resources
Irregular verbs quizzes English conjugator English-French dictionary French dictionary English dictionary Monolingual dictionaries Scores by institution Free sample tests FAQ Pricing Tourism training Blog Videos
Login Sign up
Blog
Videos
Pricing
FR EN

brittle

adj, noun, verb — 10 senses

brittle

adj

/ˈbɹɪtəl/ · [ˈbɹʷɪtʰəl] ~ [ˈbɹʷɪtʰl̩]

Etymology From Middle English britel, brutel, brotel (“brittle”), from Old English *brytel, *bryttol (“brittle, fragile”, literally “prone to or tending to break”); equivalent to brit + -le.

1

Inflexible; liable to break, snap, or shatter easily under stress, pressure, or impact.

  • Near-synonym: crackly
  • Cast iron is much more brittle than forged iron.
2 more examples
  • A diamond is hard but brittle.
  • 'Do you suppose our convent, and I too, Are insufficient, then, to pray for you? Thomas, that joke's not good. Your faith is brittle.1951, Geoffrey Chaucer, translated by Nevill Coghill, The Canterbury Tales: Translated into Modern English (Penguin Classics), Penguin Books, published 1977, page 329:
2

Not physically tough or tenacious; apt to break or crumble when bending.

  • Shortbread is my favorite cold pastry, yet being so brittle it crumbles easily, and a lot goes to waste.
3

Archaeology, History, Human sciences, Sciences Of rocks Tending to fracture in a conchoidal way; capable of being knapped or flaked.

Minerals; etc; minerals; etc

4

Emotionally fragile, easily offended.

  • What a brittle person! A little misunderstanding and he's an emotional wreck.
5

Computing, Engineering, Mathematics, Natural sciences, Physical sciences, Sciences Of a system Poorly error- or fault-tolerant; having little in the way of redundancy or defense in depth; susceptible to catastrophic failure in the event of a relatively-minor malfunction or deviance.

6

Informal, Proscribed, Of diabetes Characterized by dramatic swings in blood sugar level.

Derived terms
brittility, brittle bone disease, brittlebush, brittle cinder, brittle fracture, brittlegill, brittle hair syndrome, brittlely, brittleness, brittle star, brittlestem, brittly, embrittle, nonbrittle, quasibrittle, Sabinas brittle hair syndrome, unbrittle, work-brittle

brittle

noun

Etymology From Middle English britel, brutel, brotel (“brittle”), from Old English *brytel, *bryttol (“brittle, fragile”, literally “prone to or tending to break”); equivalent to brit + -le.

1

Usually A confection of caramelized sugar and nuts.

  • As a child, my favorite candy was peanut brittle.
2

Broadly, Usually Anything resembling this confection, such as flapjack, a cereal bar, etc.

Derived terms
peanut brittle

brittle

verb

Etymology From Middle English britel, brutel, brotel (“brittle”), from Old English *brytel, *bryttol (“brittle, fragile”, literally “prone to or tending to break”); equivalent to brit + -le.

1

To become brittle.

  • The project is based on a similar project, the Class project, which was started by the University of Cornell several years ago under the leadership of Stuart Lynn to preserve brittling old books.1999, J. Siekmann, Maria T. Pazienza, J. G. Carbonell, Information Extraction: Towards Scalable, Adaptable Systems, page 24:
  • Her heart fluttered, then stilled when May snapped the image away and her voice brittled.2020, Alys Murray, The Magnolia Sisters:
2

Obsolete To gut.

  • Not being versed in the terms of English venery, he asked Abbot Ulfketyl what brittling of a deer might mean; and being informed that it was that operation on the carcass of a stag which his countrymen called eventrer, and Highland gillies now “gralloching”[.]1866, Charles Kingsley, chapter 38, in Hereward the Wake, London: Nelson:
Related terms
embrittlement

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.