Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To reveal (secret matters) especially through indiscreet or unreserved talk.
- v. To reveal secret matters.
- v. To chatter thoughtlessly or indiscreetly. See Synonyms at gossip.
- n. An incessant or indiscreet talker.
- n. Lengthy chatter.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To utter or tell in a thoughtless or unnecessary manner (what ought to be kept secret); let out (secrets).
- To talk indiscreetly; tattle; tell tales.
- n. A babbler; a telltale; one who betrays secrets, or tells things which ought to be kept secret.
- n. A bubble; a blister; a swelling.
- To swell out or up; make swollen, as the cheeks.
Wiktionary
- v. To tell tales; to gossip without reserve or discretion.
- n. One who blabs; a babbler; a telltale; a gossip or gossiper.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To utter or tell unnecessarily, or in a thoughtless manner; to publish (secrets or trifles) without reserve or discretion; -- sometimes used with out.
- v. To talk thoughtlessly or without discretion; to tattle; to tell tales.
- n. One who blabs; a babbler; a telltale.
WordNet 3.0
- v. speak (about unimportant matters) rapidly and incessantly
- v. divulge confidential information or secrets
Etymologies
- Middle English blabben ("to talk foolishly"), back-formation from blaberen. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English blabben, to talk foolishly, back-formation from blaberen. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“I always watch on C-Span anyway to avoid all the blab from the commentators.”
“And the blab is a skill far more common to Bill Clinton's generation than to Bob Dole's.”
“Even when she reached her home again, and Mrs. Byrne followed her in, afraid of leaving the frightened woman alone lest she should "blab" the whole secret to the first person she met, -- even then Mrs. Cregan could not speak until she had gathered up the broken dishes and propped the broken chair against the wall, as frantically as if she were trying to conceal the evidence of a crime.”
“Pinkey had warned him that at the first openly hostile act he would "blab" the story of the Skull Creek episode far and wide.”
“Old Liz, meanwhile, was carefully confined to another part of the house so that she might not discover the plot, and the tiger, from whom no secrets could by any possibility be kept, was forbidden to "blab" on pain of instant death and dismissal.”
“Just exactly the kind of blab we don't need, it's an infection.”
“MPs 'blab' and governments are 'responsible for security”
“After I'm dead and buried they'll jail you two healthy ones, and keep you until you 'blab'! ”
“Heh, I finally finished typing my post so if you went to that link and saw nothin, well, sorry! was blabbing! done now! you may now behold the blab that is my frustration!”
“Raj simply told Chiesi not to blab his trading position all over Wall Street," Mr. Dowd said.”
The Wall Street Journal: Galleon Defense Blasts Prosecution Case as 'Make-Believe'
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘blab’.
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Talk Talk
Words for Talking
( open list, randomness )squawk, gab, chatter, chitchat, blab, prattle, blather, discuss, hector, plead, cajole, harangue and 200 more...
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Words For Novel
viridity, effigy, paragon, congested, acrid, lilting, clandestine, plethora, accolade, sardonic, naïve, reckoning and 285 more...
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Onomatopoetics
Words formed in imitation of a natural sound.
bumble-bee, rat-a-tat, blurt, clink, chickadee, rub-a-dub, chirr, chug, keck, flim-flam, brekekekex, thunk and 94 more...
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whitmanian
from the poetry and prose of walt whitman
celebrate, assume, loafe, grass, summer, distillation, atmosphere, undisguised, naked, mad, breath, loveroot and 291 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, B
bloviate, bejesus, brouhaha, behoove, bodacious, bamboozle, banshee, bub, bolus, blob, bubbly, bleb and 414 more...
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Tuesday words
just the next words that come along
nasality, transignification, lapsarian, disciple, slanguage, atwitter, avast, ahoy, asleep, awake, hymnody, glissade and 573 more...
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four-letter words ending with a 'b'
stub, stab, bomb, bulb, dumb, jamb, blob, club, drab, grab, slab, slob and 18 more...
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Satan's Gramophone
dank, blouse, poetess, squab, moist, sphincter, roughage, purse, blab, sepulchral, flesh, thigh and 58 more...
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favs
guffaw, blab, fidget, nosegay, insipid, crotchety, stupefied, mull, unctuous, surly, smarmy, sprezzatura
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my mother
snitty, persnickety, discombobulated, blab, cantankerous, resonate, frazzled, flabbergasted
Tweets
Looking for tweets for blab.
bilby "He caught my elbow in his eagerness and drew me towards the house. 'You can lie as snug here as if you were in a moss-hole. I'll see that nobody blabs, either. And you'll give me some more material about your adventures?'"
- John Buchan, 'The Thirty-Nine Steps'. Aug 27, 2009