v.; also bedizzen. [f. BE- + DIZEN. All English orthoepists have (əi); Webster has the alternative (i).] trans. To dress out, especially in a vulgar or gaudy fashion.
1661. K. W., Conf. Charac. (1860), 81. These petty ladies … are bedizned in sable sacks, or … in white sarcenet wallats.
1755. Johnson, Bedizen, to dress out: a low word.
a. 1779. Langhorne, Country Just. (R.). Ye cits, that sore bedizen Nature’s face!
1825. Scott, Talism. (1854), 267. You have bedizened me in green, a colour he detests.
b. fig.
a. 1788. Headley, Parod. Gray’s El. (T.). The name bedizen’d by the pedant muse.
1806. Edin. Rev., VIII. 268. The quotations … with which Mr. Lemaistre has thought fit to bedizzen his pages.
1820. W. Irving, Sketch Bk., II. 130. Bedizened out into a burlesque imitation of an antique masque.
