Embellished

How to spell embellished

11 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce embellished

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does embellished mean?

1. verbMade more attractive by adding decorative detail or ornament.
2. verbMade an account more interesting by adding details that are not strictly true.

Embellished in a sentence

• The tailor embellished the jacket with silver buttons and fine stitching.

• He embellished the account of his trip to impress his colleagues.

• The bakery embellished the cake with sugar flowers before delivery.

• The witness clearly embellished parts of her statement.

Where does embellished come from?

Language of origin: French

This word traces back to the Old French verb embellir, meaning 'to make beautiful', which English adopted in the late 1300s. The Old French form combined the prefix en- (here meaning 'to put into' or 'to make') with bel, 'beautiful', a word that descends from the Latin adjective bellus, 'pretty' or 'handsome'. English took in the inflected stem embelliss- and reshaped it with the familiar English ending -ish, the same ending seen in 'finish' and 'polish'. The original sense was purely decorative: to make a thing more attractive by adding ornament. Over time it gathered a second, slightly wry meaning, namely to make a story more colourful by adding invented details. That same bellus root survives in 'beauty' and 'belle', which is a useful reminder that the heart of the word is the double-l 'bell' you hear when you say it.

How the word is built

• em- (to make, put into)
• bell (from Latin bellus: beautiful, via Old French bel)
• -ish (verb-forming suffix)
• -ed (past tense/participle)