BRISTLE UP • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Bristle up

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/brˈɪsəl əp/ Listen

verb

Bristle v. i.

To rise or stand erect, like bristles. "His hair did bristle upon his head."

To appear as if covered with bristles; to have standing, thick and erect, like bristles. "The hill of La Haye Sainte bristling with ten thousand bayonets." "Ports bristling with thousands of masts."

To show defiance or indignation.

To bristle up, to show anger or defiance.

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Etymology of 'Bristle up'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Bristle up" Quotes from Famous Books

... seemed strange to my eye when I wrote it," said Sir Nigel. "They bristle up together like a clump of lances. We must break their ranks and set them farther apart. The word is 'that.' Now I will read it to you, Alleyne, and you shall write it out fair; for we leave Bordeaux this day, and it would be ...

— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle

... his eyes get stary, the big vein in the middle of his forehead swells threatenin', and his bushy white eyebrows seem to bristle up. ...

— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... cocks or Filipino cocks. Afterwards, they hold them up in sight of each other, close together, so that each of the enraged little creatures may see who it is that has pulled out a feather, and with whom he must fight. Their neck-feathers bristle up as they gaze at each other fixedly with flashes of anger darting from their little round eyes. Now the moment has come; the attendants place them on the ground a short distance apart and leave ...

— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... exceedingly costly from the fact that the wolves, after being caught by Mongol hunters, had been skinned alive and the skins dressed in a particular manner. Rugs made of these, he declared, on the approach to the house of wild animals, robbers or of any threatening danger, would bristle up as if still on the back of the live animal when angered, and so give timely warning to the inmates; for which reason they ...

— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready

... Cochise getting out of hand? All the time it's harder to hold him. He's beginning to bristle up ...

— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet