flabbergasted

English

WOTD – 30 October 2006

Alternative forms

• flabagasted
• flambergasted

Etymology

Past tense of flabbergast.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈflæbə(ˌ)ɡɑːstəd/, /ˈflæbə(ˌ)ɡæstəd/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈflæbɚˌɡæstəd/

• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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Adjective

flabbergasted (comparative more flabbergasted, superlative most flabbergasted)

1. Appalled, annoyed, exhausted or disgusted.

   He was flabbergasted at how much weight he had gained.

   • 1952, Agnes Morley Cleaveland., Satan's Paradise: from Lucien Maxwell to Fred Lambert, Houghton-Mifflin:

     Maxwell made a lunge at his flabbergasted guest, who ducked just in time to escape the great hands reaching for him.

   • 2008, Dutch Sheets, Watchman Prayer: Keeping the Enemy Out While Protecting Your Family, Home, Gospel Light, page 57:

     From behind her paper, she was flabbergasted to see a neatly dressed man helping himself to her cookies.

   • 2014 August 16, BBC News, Why have tailgate parties not spread to the UK?‎^[3]:

     On his first encounter with tailgating in 2006, he was flabbergasted at the way rival fans mixed peaceably together at the parties. A Chicago Bears fan, he was warmly welcomed into a group of Arizona Cardinals fans and fed. "I was shocked and slightly worried. I thought they were going to poison me. It was just so odd."

2. (euphemistic, rare) Damned.

Synonyms

See Thesaurus:astonished

Derived terms

• flabbergastedly
• flabbergastedness
• unflabbergasted

Translations

appalled, annoyed, exhausted or disgusted

• Finnish: äimistynyt, kauhistunut (fi), tuohtunut
• French: sidéré (fr)
• Hungarian: elképedt (hu), döbbent (hu), megdöbbent (hu)

euphemistic: damned

• Finnish: hattuuntunut (fi)

Verb

flabbergasted

1. simple past and past participle of flabbergast

Anagrams

• gabberflasted