Library / English Dictionary

CONFOUND

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Mistake one thing for another

Example:

I mistook her for the secretary

Synonyms:

confound; confuse

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Hypernyms (to "confound" is one way to...):

misidentify; mistake (identify incorrectly)

Verb group:

blur; confuse; obnubilate; obscure (make unclear, indistinct, or blurred)

confuse; jumble; mix up (assemble without order or sense)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s something PP

Sense 2

Meaning:

Be confusing or perplexing to; cause to be unable to think clearly

Example:

This question befuddled even the teacher

Synonyms:

bedevil; befuddle; confound; confuse; discombobulate; fox; fuddle; throw

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Hypernyms (to "confound" is one way to...):

be (have the quality of being; (copula, used with an adjective or a predicate noun))

Verb group:

confuse; disconcert; flurry; put off (cause to feel embarrassment)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "confound"):

demoralize (confuse or put into disorder)

amaze; baffle; beat; bewilder; dumbfound; flummox; get; gravel; mystify; nonplus; perplex; pose; puzzle; stick; stupefy; vex (be a mystery or bewildering to)

disorient; disorientate (cause to be lost or disoriented)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s somebody
Something ----s somebody
Something ----s something

Sentence example:

The performance is likely to confound Sue

Credits

 Context examples: 

You must not confound us with London in general, my dear sir.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Here I have this confounded son of a Dutchman sitting in my own house drinking of my own rum!

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

The authors acknowledge that other confounding factors could explain the associations between artificial light at night and weight gain.

(Sleeping with artificial light at night associated with weight gain in women, National Institutes of Health)

Sam, stop your confounded pipe, or I shall be after you.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

“Speaking professionally, it was admirably done,” cried I, looking in amazement at this man who was forever confounding me with some new phase of his astuteness.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Yes, confound him!

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

She waved her hand to me to go away, so earnestly, that, all confounded as I was, I turned from them at once.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

"Hush, he's in the garden! I forgot the confounded jelly, but it can't be helped now," said John, surveying the prospect with an anxious eye.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Come, Miss Morland, be quick, for the others are in a confounded hurry to be off.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

Some of them seized my cake, and carried it piecemeal away; others flew about my head and face, confounding me with the noise, and putting me in the utmost terror of their stings.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)