confound
Plural: confounds
Verb
Verb Forms: confounded, confounding, confounds
- To cause confusion or surprise, often by contradiction.
- be confusing or perplexing to; cause to be unable to think clearly
- mistake one thing for another
- To perplex or puzzle.
- To stun or amaze.
- To fail to see the difference; to mix up; to confuse right and wrong.
- To make something worse.
- To combine in a confused fashion; to mingle so as to make the parts indistinguishable.
- To cause to be ashamed; to abash.
- To defeat, to frustrate, to thwart.
- To damn (a mild oath).
- To destroy, ruin, or devastate; to bring to ruination.
Noun
- A confounding variable.
Examples
- Confound the lady!
- Confound you!
- Don't confound the situation by yelling.
- His actions confounded the skeptics.
- His unexpected bingo play was enough to CONFOUND his opponent’s strategy.
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English confounden (“destroy, ruin, perplex”), from Anglo-Norman cunfundre and Old French confondre, from Latin cōnfundō (“to mingle, mix together”). Related to found (“to melt (metals in a foundry)”) (but not to found (“to start”), nor to find) and to fusion.
Synonyms
bedevil, befuddle, confuse, discombobulate, fox, fuddle, throw, baffle, baffound, bamboozle, bemuse, bewilder, bumfuzzle, complicate, confound, confounder, confuddle, confuzzle, dazzle, disconcert, dumbfound, ferhoodle, flabagast, flabbergast, flabbergaster, flummox, flurry, fluster, jumble, knot, lose, mix up, perplex, puzzle, stick
Scrabble Score: 14
confound: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordconfound: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
confound: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary