1. The hair that grows on the chin,lips and adjacent parts of the face,chiefly of male adults; hence a mark of virility. A gray beard, long beard and reverend beard, are terms for old age.

2. Beard is sometimes used for the face, and to do a thing to a man's beard,is to do it in defiance, or to his face.

3. The awn or sharp prickles on the ears of corn. But more technically, parallel hairs or a tuft of stiff hairs terminating the leaves of plants, a species of pubescence. By some authors the name is given to the lower lip of a ringent corol.

4. A barb or sharp point of an arrow, or other instrument, bent backward from the end to prevent its being easily drawn out.

5. The beard or chuck of a horse, is that part which bears the curb of a bridle,underneath the lower mandible and above the chin.

6. The rays of a comet, emitted towards that part of the heaven to which its proper motion See ms to direct it.

7. The threads or hairs of an oyster, muscle or similar shell-fish, by which they fasten themselves to stones.

8. In insects, two small, oblong, fleshy bodies, placed just above the trunk, as in gnats, moths and butterflies.

, v.t. berd. To take by the beard; to seize, pluck, or pull the beard, in contempt or anger.

1. To oppose to the face; to set at defiance.

I have been bearded by boys.