Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- transitive verb To be unsuitable or inappropriate for.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To fail to become or beseem; suitill; be unfitting.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb Not to become; to suit ill; not to befit or be adapted to.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb To be
unsuitable ,unbefitting , ormaladapted .
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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There were answers from every quarter — that it would have been too much to expect Miss Mowbray to dress for their amusement a second time — that nothing she chose to wear could misbecome Miss
Saint Ronan's Well 2008
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Her gaiety of the preceding day had given rise [place] to a deep shade of melancholy, which, however, did not misbecome an occasion so momentous.
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Reformers believed, it would not misbecome us to inquire nearer home, what these companions and contemporaries of ours think and do, at least so far as these thoughts and actions appear to be not accidental and personal, but common to many, and the inevitable flower of the Tree of Time.
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I apply not this instance: but, Sir Hargrave, as I hope to see you married, and happy, though it can never be, I think, to Miss Byron, such gene-rous acknowledgments as misbecome not an Ita — lian, I shall then hope for from an Englishman.
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You know, madam, she is a strange woman; but nothing could misbecome me more, than to presume to give any hint to one of your great understanding and great knowledge of the world, besides barely informing you of the matter of fact.
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I assure you it did not at all misbecome him; he looked quite Eastern, except that he is so fair.
Villette 2003
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The little Kentuckian, with her emphatic, sham-hating face, and Grey, whose simple, calm outlook on the world made her last year's bonnet and cloak dwindle into such irrelevant trifles, did not misbecome the place.
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And if mens eares were not perchaunce to daintie, or their iudgementes ouer partiall, would peraduenture nothing at all misbecome our arte, but make in our meetres a more pleasant numerositie then now is.
The Arte of English Poesie George Puttenham
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As the crimson-purple, plume-like prince's feather has its own royal charm in Southern gardens beside the pale and placidlily, so these luxuriant adornments, do not misbecome his full and not too fleshy person.
Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 11, No. 22, January, 1873 Various
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"No, my bright brunette; but that Satanic mixture does not misbecome you," -- and he murmured the words in "May Janet," --
Bluebell A Novel Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
qroqqa commented on the word misbecome
'A little more deference to my friends, Miss Campinet, would not misbecome you.'
—Robert Bage, 1796, Hermsprong
March 22, 2009