muffle

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To wrap up, as in a blanket or shawl, for warmth, protection, or secrecy.
2. v. To wrap or pad in order to deaden the sound: muffled the drums.
3. v. To deaden (a sound): The sand muffled the hoofbeats.
4. v. To make vague or obscure: "His message was so muffled by learning and 'artiness'” ( Walter Blair).
5. v. To repress; stifle.
6. n. Something that muffles.
7. n. A kiln or part of a kiln in which pottery can be fired without being exposed to direct flame.
8. n. The fleshy, hairless snout of certain mammals, such as ruminants.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To infold or wrap up, especially in some cloth or woven fabric, so as to conceal from view or protect from the weather; wrap up or cover close, particularly the neck and face; envelop or inwrap in some covering.
2. To blindfold.
3. Figuratively, to wrap up or cover; conceal; involve.
4. To envelop more or less completely in something that deadens sound: used especially of bells, drums, and oars. See muffled.
5. To restrain from speaking by wrapping up the head; put to silence.
6. Synonyms Muzzle, etc. See gag.
7. To mumble; mutter; speak indistinctly.
8. n. The tumid and naked part of the upper lip and nose of ruminants and rodents.

Wiktionary

1. n. Anything that mutes or deadens sound.
2. n. A warm piece of clothing for the hands.
3. n. A kiln or furnace, often electric, with no direct flames (a muffle furnace)
4. v. transitive To wrap up (a person, face etc.) in fabric or another covering, for warmth or protection.
5. v. transitive To wrap up or cover (a source of noise) in order to deaden the sound.
6. v. transitive To mute or deaden (a sound etc.).

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The bare end of the nose between the nostrils; -- used esp. of ruminants.
2. v. To wrap up in something that conceals or protects; to wrap, as the face and neck, in thick and disguising folds; hence, to conceal or cover the face of; to envelop; to inclose; -- often with up.
3. v. To prevent seeing, or hearing, or speaking, by wraps bound about the head; to blindfold; to deafen.
4. v. To wrap or fit with something that dulls or deadens the sound of.
5. v. To speak indistinctly, or without clear articulation.
6. n. Anything with which another thing, as an oar or drum, is muffled; also, a boxing glove; a muff.
7. n. (Metal.) An earthenware compartment or oven, often shaped like a half cylinder, used in furnaces to protect objects heated from the direct action of the fire, as in scorification of ores, cupellation of ore buttons, etc.
8. n. (Ceramics) A small oven for baking and fixing the colors of painted or printed pottery, without exposing the pottery to the flames of the furnace or kiln.
9. n. A pulley block containing several sheaves.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. deaden (a sound or noise), especially by wrapping
2. v. conceal or hide
3. n. a kiln with an inner chamber for firing things at a low temperature