bastard
UK /ˈbɑːs.təd/ · US /ˈbæs.tɚd/ noun, adjective, interjection, verb, proper noun
Forms bastards bastard! bastarding bastarded bastid
- noun (dated) A person who was born out of wedlock, and hence often considered an illegitimate descendant.
- noun A mongrel (biological cross between different breeds, groups or varieties).
- noun (vulgar, offensive or derogatory, usually referring specifically to a man) A contemptible, inconsiderate, overly or arrogantly rude or spiteful person. “Some bastard stole my car while I was helping an injured person.”
- noun (endearing or humorous) A man, a fellow, a male friend. “lucky bastard”
- noun (often preceded by ‘poor’) A suffering person deemed deserving of compassion. “Poor bastard, I feel so sorry for him.”
- noun (informal) A child who does not know their father.
- noun (informal) Something extremely difficult or unpleasant to deal with. “Life can be a real bastard.”
- noun A variation that is not genuine; something irregular or inferior or of dubious origin, fake or counterfeit. “The architecture was a kind of bastard, suggesting Gothic but not being true Gothic.”
- adjective Of or like a bastard (illegitimate human descendant).
- adjective Of or like a bastard (bad person).
- adjective Of or like a mongrel, bastardized creature/cross.
- adjective Of abnormal, irregular or otherwise inferior qualities (size, shape etc). “a bastard musket”
- adjective Spurious, lacking authenticity: counterfeit, fake.
- adjective (of a language) Imperfect; not spoken or written well or in the classical style; broken.
- adjective Used in the vernacular name of a species to indicate that it is similar in some way to another species, often (but not always) one of another genus. “bastard gemsbok; bastard mahogany; bastard toadflax; bastard trumpeter”
- adjective (UK, Ireland, vulgar) Very unpleasant. “I’ve got a bastard headache.”
- interjection (vulgar, rare) Exclamation of strong dismay or strong sense of being upset.
- verb (obsolete) To bastardize.
- proper noun A surname from Old French.
Synonyms
love child born in the vestry illegitimate son of a bitch arsehole asshole ass assface asshat asswipe bitch blackguard blaggard buttlicker buttmunch carrion cockhead cocklicker cocksucker cowson dickhead shit mother fucker motherfucker prick whoreson SOB by-blow illegitimate child mongrel
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English bastard, bastarde, from Old English bastard (used as an epithet), from Anglo-Norman bastard, Old French bastart (“illegitimate child”), perhaps via Medieval Latin bastardus, of obscure origin.
Likely from Frankish *bāst (“marriage, relationship”) + Old French -ard, -art (pejorative suffix denoting a specific quality or condition). Frankish *bāst derives from a North Sea Germanic variety of Proto-Germanic *banstuz (“bond, connection, relationship, marriage with a second woman of lower status”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰendʰ- (“to tie, bind”) and is related to West Frisian boaste (“marriage, matrimony”), Middle Dutch bast (“lust, heat”), and more distantly to English boose (“cow-stall”). The term probably originally referred to a child from a polygynous marriage of heathen Germanic custom — a practice not sanctioned by the Christian churches.
Alternatively, and less likely, Old French bastart may have originated from the Old French term fils de bast (“packsaddle son”), meaning a child conceived on an improvised bed (medieval saddles often doubled as beds while travelling). However chronology makes this difficult, as bastard is attested in Old French from 1089 (Middle Latin bastardus as early as 1010), yet Old French bast (modern French bât), though attested since 1130 with the meaning of "beast of burden", doesn't acquire the specific meaning of "packsaddle" until the 13c., making it too late to have given rise to the terms bastard and bastardus with this sense. The French Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales supports the Germanic theory further above as being most likely.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A "natural" child; a child begotten and born out of wedlock; an illegitimate child; one born of an illicit union.
- noun (a) An inferior quality of soft brown sugar, obtained from the sirups that (b) A large size of mold, in which sugar is drained.
- adjective Begotten and born out of lawful matrimony; illegitimate. See Bastard, n., note.
- adjective Lacking in genuineness; spurious; false; adulterate; --applied to things which resemble those which are genuine, but are really not so. That bastard self-love which is so vicious in itself, and productive of so many vices. Barrow.
Etymology [OF. bastard, bastart, F. b, prob. fr. OF. bast, F. b, a packsaddle used as a bed by the muleteers (fr. LL. bastum) + -ard. OF. fils de bast son of the packsaddle; as the muleteers were accustomed to use their saddles for beds in the inns. See Cervantes, "Don Quixote," chap. 16; and cf.G. bankert, fr. bank bench.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “bastard”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details