bead

To form into a bead.

Noun

  1. Prayer, later especially with a rosary.
    • That he must believe in the Pope;—go to Mass;—cross himself;—tell his beads;—be a good Catholick, and that this, in all conscience, was enough to carry him to heaven. - 1760, Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of...
  2. Each in a string of small balls making up the rosary or paternoster.
    • Holonym: prayer beads

    Synonyms: prayer bead

  3. A small, round object.

    1. A small, round object with a hole to allow it to be threaded on a cord or wire, particularly for decorative purposes.

    2. Various small, round solid objects.

      • Similar studies of rats have employed four different intracranial resorbable, slow sustained release systems—surgical foam, a thermal gel depot, a microcapsule or biodegradable polymer beads. - 2013 May-June, Charles T....

    3. A small drop of water or other liquid.

      • beads of sweat

    4. A bubble, in spirits.

    5. A small, round ball at the end of a barrel of a gun used for aiming.

      • She drew a bead on the target and fired.
      • But then I had the [massive] flintlock by me for protection. ¶[…]The linen-press and a chest on the top of it formed, however, a very good gun-carriage; and, thus mounted, aim could be taken out of the window[…], and a...

    6. A small, round ball at the end of a barrel of a gun used for aiming.

      (by extension) Knowledge sufficient to direct one's activities to a purpose.

      • We now have a bead on the main technical issues for the project
  4. A ridge, band, or molding.

    1. A rigid edge of a tire that mounts it on a wheel; tire bead.

    2. (architecture) A narrow molding with semicircular section.

      Synonyms: beading

  5. A glassy drop of molten flux, as borax or microcosmic salt, used as a solvent and color test for several mineral earths and oxides, as of iron, manganese, etc., before the blowpipe.
    • the borax bead; the iron bead, etc.
  6. A decorative, convex, rounded profile (often a half-circle) cut into an edge or surface of wood, typically defined by a narrow, deep channel called a quirk.

Origin

From Middle English bede (“a prayer”), also “a bead for counting prayers” in a peire of bedes (literally “a pair of beads”), from Old English bedu, bed, ġebed (“a request, entreaty, prayer”), from Proto-West Germanic *bedu, *bed, *gabed, from Proto-Germanic *bedō, *bedą. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Gebäd (“prayer”), Cimbrian gapéet (“prayer”), Dutch gebed and bede (“prayer”), German Gebet (“prayer”), Low German Gebett (“prayer”), Luxembourgish Gebiet (“prayer”), Vilamovian gybāt (“prayer”).

Forms

beads

Hyponyms

hair pipe

Derived

adder bead anal beads angle bead Baily's beads beadboard bead breaker beaded lacewing beaded lizard beader beadery bead fern beadful beadless beadlet bead lightning beadlike bead lily beadmaker beadmaking bead maze bead proof bead-rattler beadroll bead seat

Verb

  1. To form into a bead.
    • The raindrops beaded on the car's waxed finish.

    1. To form into a bead.

      • He beaded some solder for the ends of the wire.
  2. To apply beads to.
    • She spent the morning beading the gown.
  3. To cause beads to form on (something).
    • Only the hum of the miserable creatures stirred the heavy murk that beaded our foreheads with sweat as we pushed our way through it. - 1941, Emily Carr, “Greenville”, in Klee Wyck:

Forms

beads beading beaded