overspell
verbEtymology From over- + spell.
1
To make spelling mistakes by adding extra letters.
- “Exactly,” said the professor; “he overspells in some places, but it was not for its spelling but for its honesty that I laid it before you, Mr. Trustee.”1896, Walter Lecky, Mr. Billy Buttons: A Novel, page 85:
- ...author attempts a little more, and, like Lowell in the 'Biglow Papers,' rather overspells his dialect.1902, The Nation - Volume 75, page 290:
1 more example
- If you overspelled by adding an extra letter or letters, capitalize the letters on each side of the spot where you committed the overspell.1980, Vernon Buck, Theodore Rappaport, Basic spelling skills: a program for self-instruction, →ISBN, page 80:
2
To state something in too much detail or too explicitly.
- The main difference between America's humor and England's humour is that they overspell it.1969, William Cole, The Punch line:
- He admits his first attempts were overworked and overspelled, "as though a chicken had walked over them."1973, Robert Wakefield, Schwiering and the West, page 32:
1 more example
- On the contrary, exactly those principles are already overspelled.1993, Jan Kooiman, Modern Governance: New Government-Society Interactions, →ISBN, page 227:
3
To take over by a magic spell.
- A river of black gore gushed from the wound, And reeling back he fell supine on earth : A ghastly glamour overspelled his eye, And thro' and over all his mailed skin :1891, Gilbert Beresford, Poems, page 39:
- She smiled like one who might have been A daughter of the Fairy Queen ; And all the people who beheld The Vision pass, were overspelled, And, looking in her wondrous eyes, Straight dreamed themselves in Paradise.1908, Glasgow Ballad Club, Ballads and Poems, page 42:
1 more example
- He must have been overspelled from behind, by surprise; for the last memory he had was of walking through his own woods at evening talking with the trees.2012, John Joseph Adams, Epic: Legends of Fantasy, →ISBN, page 85: