BESPOKE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Bespoke

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verb

Bespeak v. t. (past bespoke, archaic bespake; past part. bespoken; pres. part. bespeaking)

To speak or arrange for beforehand; to order or engage against a future time; as, to bespeak goods, a right, or a favor. "Concluding, naturally, that to gratify his avarice was to bespeak his favor."

To show beforehand; to foretell; to indicate. "(They) bespoke dangers... in order to scare the allies."

To betoken; to show; to indicate by external marks or appearances. "When the abbot of St. Martin was born, he had so little the figure of a man that it bespoke him rather a monster."

To speak to; to address. (Poetic) "He thus the queen bespoke."

Bespeak v. i. (past bespoke, archaic bespake; past part. bespoken; pres. part. bespeaking) To speak. (Obs.)

Bespoke v. Imp. & p. p. of Bespeak.

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Etymology of 'Bespoke'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Bespoke" Quotes from Famous Books

... came to an anchorage on the bench, within easy talking distance of its original occupant. The uncared-for clothes, the aggressive, grizzled beard, and the furtive, evasive eye of the new-comer bespoke the professional cadger, the man who would undergo hours of humiliating tale- spinning and rebuff rather than adventure on half ...

— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki

... welcomed him with their shrill shouts, the damsels with songs of praise, and the young men, with the pipe and tabor, marched before him to the May-pole, which was bedecked with flowers and bloom. There the rural dance began. A plentiful dinner, with oceans of good liquor, was bespoke at the White Hart. The whole village was regaled at the squire's expense; and both the day and the night was spent ...

— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett

... your Lordship, I was so big with the satisfaction of having an opportunity given me by my Ladies at once of obliging them, paying a small respect to you, and doing a good office to a deserving gentleman, that I did not let one day pass before I had bespoke and obtained His Majesty's and Royal Highness's promise of favour in Mr. Bonithan's behalf: and was so far afterwards from failing him in my further assistances with Captain Trevanion and others, that I took early care to secure him a lieutenancy, by a commission actually ...

— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various

... dress to receive him—everything was full fig. Spigot appeared in buckled shorts and black silk stockings; while vases of evergreens and winter flowers mounted sentry on passage tables and landing-places. Everything bespoke the elegant ...

— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... departed years, there came a young maiden treading lightsomely on tip-toe along the street from the direction of the railroad depot. She was evidently a stranger, and perhaps had come to town by the evening train of cars. There was a smiling cheerfulness in this fair maiden's face which bespoke her fully confident of a kind reception from the multitude of people with whom she was soon to form acquaintance. Her dress was rather too airy for the season, and was bedizened with fluttering ribbons ...

— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

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