Dictionary Definition
dull adj
1 lacking in liveliness or animation; "he was so
dull at parties"; "a dull political campaign"; "a large dull
impassive man"; "dull days with nothing to do"; "how dull and
dreary the world is"; "fell back into one of her dull moods" [ant:
lively]
2 emitting or reflecting very little light; "a
dull glow"; "dull silver badly in need of a polish"; "a dull sky"
[ant: bright]
3 being or made softer or less loud or clear;
"the dull boom of distant breaking waves"; "muffled drums"; "the
muffled noises of the street"; "muted trumpets" [syn: muffled, muted, softened]
4 so lacking in interest as to cause mental
weariness; "a boring evening with uninteresting people"; "the
deadening effect of some routine tasks"; "a dull play"; "his
competent but dull performance"; "a ho-hum speaker who couldn't
capture their attention"; "what an irksome task the writing of long
letters is"- Edmund Burke; "tedious days on the train"; "the
tiresome chirping of a cricket"- Mark Twain; "other people's dreams
are dreadfully wearisome" [syn: boring, deadening, ho-hum, irksome, slow, tedious, tiresome, wearisome]
5 (of color) very low in saturation; highly
diluted; "dull greens and blues"
6 not keenly felt; "a dull throbbing"; "dull
pain" [ant: sharp]
7 slow to learn or understand; lacking
intellectual acuity; "so dense he never understands anything I say
to him"; "never met anyone quite so dim"; "although dull at
classical learning, at mathematics he was uncommonly quick"-
Thackeray; "dumb officials make some really dumb decisions"; "he
was either normally stupid or being deliberately obtuse"; "worked
with the slow students" [syn: dense, dim, dumb, obtuse, slow]
8 (of business) not active or brisk; "business is
dull (or slow)"; "a sluggish market" [syn: slow, sluggish]
9 not having a sharp edge or point; "the knife
was too dull to be of any use" [ant: sharp]
10 blunted in responsiveness or sensibility; "a
dull gaze"; "so exhausted she was dull to what went on about her"-
Willa Cather
11 not clear and resonant; sounding as if
striking with or against something relatively soft; "the dull
thud"; "thudding bullets" [syn: thudding]
12 darkened with overcast; "a dark day"; "a dull
sky"; "a gray rainy afternoon"; "gray clouds"; "the sky was leaden
and thick" [syn: gray,
grey, leaden]
Verb
1 make dull in appearance; "Age had dulled the
surface"
2 become dull or lusterless in appearance; lose
shine or brightness; "the varnished table top dulled with
time"
6 become less interesting or attractive [syn:
pall]
7 make less lively or vigorous; "Middle age
dulled her appetite for travel"
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Adjective
en-adj er- Lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp.
- All these knives are dull.
- Boring;
not exciting or
interesting.
- He sat through the dull lecture and barely stayed awake.
- When does having a dull personality ever get you a girlfriend? Even if you get one, how does being dull help you keep a relationship for over a year?
- He sat through the dull lecture and barely stayed awake.
- Not shiny; having a
matte finish or no
particular luster.
- Choose a dull finish to hide fingerprints.
- Not bright or intelligent.
- Sam buying Kelly a book about shoes for her birthday
Translations
Lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp
Boring
- Danish: kedelig
- Dutch: saai
- Finnish: tylsä, pitkäveteinen, pitkästyttävä
- French: ennuyeux, barbant
- German: fad, langweilig
- Japanese: (, taikutsuna)
- Norwegian: kjedelig
- Polish: nudny, nudna, nudne
- Portuguese: entediante
- Spanish: aburrido
- Swedish: tråkig
- Turkish: sıkıcı
Not shiny
Not bright or intelligent
Verb
Translations
(transitive) To render dull; to remove or blunt
an edge or something that was sharp
- German: abstumpfen
- Norwegian: sløve
(transitive) To soften, moderate or blunt
- German: abstumpfen
(intransitive) To lose a sharp edge; to become
dull
- German: abstumpfen
Extensive Definition
Dull may refer to:
- Dull, Perth and Kinross, Scotland, United Kingdom
- Dull Gret, a figure of Flemish folklore
People with the surname Dull:
- Gladys Dull (born 1918), longest living person with type 1 diabetes
- Jack Dull (1930-1995), professor at the University of Washington
- John Dull (21st century), American musician
See also
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
KO,
Laodicean, Olympian, Quaker-colored,
Spartan, abate, abeyant, abrupt, achromatic, achromatize, achromic, acier, affectless, allay, alleviate, aloof, anemic, anesthetic, anesthetize, anesthetized, apathetic, appease, arctic, arid, ascetic, ashen, ashy, asleep, assuage, asthenic, attemper, attenuate, austere, autistic, backward, bad, baffle, bald, banausic, bank the fire,
bare, barren, bate, bated, becloud, bedaze, bedim, beef-witted, befog, benumb, benumbed, besot, betwixt and between,
blah, blanch, blank, blase, bleach, blear, blear-witted, bled white,
blind, bloodless, blue, bluff, blunt, blunt-edged, blunt-ended,
blunt-pointed, blunt-witted, blunted, bluntish, blur, blurry, bored, boring, bovine, brainless, broken-record,
bromidic, cadaverous, callous, candid, canescent, cast down, cataleptic, catatonic, characterless, chasten, chicken, chill, chilly, chloranemic, chloroform, cinereous, cinerous, cloddish, cloud, clouded, cloudy, cold, cold as charity,
cold-blooded, coldcock,
coldhearted,
colorless, comatose, common, commonplace, constrain, control, cool, cowardly, cramp, crass, cripple, cushion, damp, damped, dampen, dampened, dapple, dapple-gray, dappled, dappled-gray, dark, darken, de-emphasize, dead, deaden, deaden the pain, deadened, deadly pale, deafen, deathly pale, debilitate, debilitated, decolor, decolorize, dejected, dense, depressed, depressing, desensitize, desensitized, detached, devitalize, dim, dim-witted, diminish, dimmed, dingy, direct, discolor, discolored, disedge, disinterested, dismal, dispassionate, dispirited, doltish, dope, dopey, dormant, dove-colored,
dove-gray, down, downhearted, downplay, drab, draggy, drain, drain of color, draw the
teeth, drearisome,
dreary, drooping, droopy, drug, drugged, dry, dryasdust, dull of mind,
dull-edged, dull-headed, dull-pated, dull-pointed, dull-witted,
dulled, dullish, dumb, dun, duncical, dusty, earthbound, ease, ease matters, edgeless, effete, elephantine, emotionally
dead, emotionless,
empty, enervate, enervated, enfeeble, etherize, etiolate, etiolated, even-tempered,
everlasting,
eviscerate, exanimate, exhaust, exhausting, exsanguinated, exsanguine, exsanguineous, extenuate, fade, faded, fagging, faint, faintish, fair, fair to middling, faired, fairish, fallow, fat-witted, fatiguing, feeble, feebleminded, flabby, flaccid, flat, floppy, foment, foul, frank, freeze, frigid, frosted, frosty, frozen, fume, ghastly, give relief, glaucescent, glaucous, gloomy, gone, gray, gray-black, gray-brown,
gray-colored, gray-drab, gray-green, gray-spotted, gray-toned,
gray-white, grayed,
grayish, grey, griseous, grizzle, grizzled, grizzly, groggy, gross-headed, gruel, gutless, haggard, half-witted, hard, hardened, harping, hazy, heartless, heavy, hebetate, hebetudinous, ho-hum,
hollow, homely, homespun, hopeless, hueless, humdrum, hypochromic, icy, imbecile, immovable, impassible, impassive, imperceptive, impercipient, imperturbable, impotent, in a stupor, in
abeyance, in suspense, inactive, inane, inanimate, indifferent, indistinct, inert, inexcitable, infecund, infertile, inirritable, insensate, insensible, insensitive, insentient, insipid, insouciant, insusceptible, inured, invariable, irksome, iron-gray, jaded, jejune, jog-trot, kayo, keep within bounds, knock
out, knock senseless, knock stiff, knock unconscious, lackadaisical, lackluster, languid, languorous, latent, lay, lay low, lay out, lead-gray,
leaden, lean, lenify, lessen, lethargic, lifeless, lighten, limber, limp, listless, literal, livid, logy, long-winded, low-spirited,
lowering, lull, lumpish, lurid, lusterless, lustless, marrowless, mat, matter-of-fact, mealy, mediocre, medium, middling, mitigate, moderate, modest, modulate, mollify, monotone, monotonous, moribund, moronic, mouse-colored,
mouse-gray, mousy,
muddy, muffle, muffled, mull, mundane, murky, mute, muted, namby-pamby, narcotize, natural, neat, nerveless, neutral, nonchalant, nonemotional, nubilous, numb, numbed, numbing, numskulled, obdurate, objective, obscure, obtund, obtundent, obtuse, of a kind, of a sort, of
sorts, opaque, open, ordinary, out of touch,
overcast, overclouded, pad, pale, pale as death, pale-faced,
palliate, pallid, palsy, paralyze, passable, passionless, passive, pasty, patient, pearl, pearl-gray, pearly, pedestrian, peroxide, phlegmatic, pithless, plain, plain-speaking,
plain-spoken, play down, plodding, pluckless, poetryless, pointless, poky, ponderous, pooped, poultice, pour balm into, pour
oil on, powerless,
prolix, prosaic, prosing, prosy, pure, put to sleep, rattle, reduce, reduce the temperature,
relieve, repress, resigned, respectable, restrain, retard, retund, rocky, rounded, rubbery, rustic, sad, sallow, salve, sap, sapless, sated, sedentary, self-absorbed,
severe, shake, shake up, sickly, silver, silver-gray, silvered, silvery, simple, simple-speaking, simpleminded, sinewless, singsong, slack, slacken, slake, slate-colored, slaty, sleeping, sleepy, slow, slow down, slow-witted,
sluggish, slumbering, smoke-gray,
smoky, smoldering, smoothed, smother, smothered, so-so, sober, sober down, soft, soft-pedal, soften, soften up, softened, solemn, somber, somnolent, soothe, soporific, sordo, soulless, spare, spineless, spiritless, spunkless, stagnant, stagnating, staid, standing, stark, static, steady, steel-gray, steely, sterile, stiff, stifle, stifled, stodgy, stoic, stolid, stone-colored, stop, straightforward,
strengthless,
stuffy, stultified, stun, stupe, stupefied, stupefy, stupid, subdue, subdued, subfusc, sunless, superficial, supine, suppress, suspended, tallow-faced,
tame, tarnish, tasteless, taupe, tedious, temper, thick, thick-brained,
thick-headed, thick-pated, thick-skinned, thick-witted, thickskulled, tiresome, tiring, tolerable, tone down, toneless, torpid, treadmill, tune down, turn, unadorned, unaffected, unaffectionate, unaroused, unbrace, uncaring, uncolored, unconcerned, undermine, underplay, undisturbable, unedged, unembellished, unemotional, uneventful, unfanciful, unfeeling, unfelt, unflappable, unhardened, unideal, unidealistic, unimaginative, unimpassioned, unimpressionable,
uninspired, uninterested, uninteresting, uninventive, unirritable, unlively, unloving, unman, unnerve, unnerved, unnervous, unoriginal, unpassionate, unperceptive, unpoetic, unpoetical, unpointed, unresponding, unresponsive, unromantic, unromanticized, unsharp, unsharpened, unstrengthen, unstring, unstrung, unsusceptible, unsympathetic, untouchable, unvarnished, unvarying, vapid, vegetable, vegetative, wan, wash out, washed-out, waxen, weak, weaken, weakly, weariful, wearisome, weary, whey-faced, white, whiten, wishy-washy, withdrawn, wooden,
world-weary