Loading page
say it: bahrbd
barbed is an adjective meaning "capable of wounding". It is pronounced /ˈbɑɹbd/ — bahrbd. It carries 2 recorded senses.
capable of wounding
“a barbed compliment”
“a biting aphorism”
“pungent satire”
having or covered with protective barbs or quills or spines or thorns or setae etc.
“a horse with a short bristly mane”
“bristly shrubs”
“burred fruits”
“setaceous whiskers”
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for barbed come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.