pret. beat; pp. beat

To strike repeatedly; to lay on repeated blows, with a stick, with the hand or fist, or with any instrument, and for any cause, just or unjust, or for punishment. Luke 12:45; Deuteronomy 25:2, 3.

To strike an instrument of music; to play on, as a drum.

To break, bruise, comminute, or pulverize by beating or pounding, as pepper or spices. Exodus 30:36.

To extend by beating, as gold or other malleable substance; or to hammer into any form; to forge. Exodus 39:3.

To strike bushes, to shake by beating, or to make a noise to rouse game.

To thresh; to force out corn from the husk by blows.

To break, mix or agitate by beating; as, to beat an egg with any other thing.

To dash or strike, as water; to strike or brush, as wind.

To tread, as a path.

To overcome in a battle, contest or strife; to vanquish or conquer; as, one beats another at play. Phrrhus beat the Carthaginians at sea.

To harass; to exercise severely; to overlabor; as, to beat the brains about logic. To beat down, to break, destroy, throw down, by beating or battering, as a wall. Also, to press down or lay flat, as by treading, by a current of water, by violent wind. Also, to lower the price by importunity or argument. Also, to depress or crush; as, to bet down opposition. Also, to sink or lessen the price or value. Usury beats down the price of land. To beat back, to compel to retire or return. To beat into, to teach or instill, by repetition of instruction. To beat up, to attack suddenly; to alarm or disturb; as, to beat up an enemy’s quarters. To beat the wing, to flutter; to move with fluttering agitation. To beat off, to repel or drive back. To beat the hoof, to walk; to go on foot. To beat time, to measure or regulate time in music by the motion of the hand or foot. In the manerge, a horse beats the dust, when at each motion he does not take in ground enough with his fore legs; and at curvets, when he does them too precipitately, or too low. He beats upon a walk, when he walks too short. To beat out, to extend by hammering. In popular use, to be beat out, is to be extremely fatigued; to have the strength exhausted by labor or exertion.

To more with pulsation, as the pulse beats; or to throb, as the heart beats.

To dash with force, as a storm, flood, passion; as, the tempest beats against the house.

To knock at a door. Judges 19:22.

To fluctuate; to be in agitation. To beat about, to try to find; to search by various means or ways. To beat upon, to act upon with violence. Also, to speak frequently; to enforce by repetition. To beat up for soldiers, is to go about to enlist men into the army. In seamanship, to beat, is to make progress against the direction of the wind, by sailing in a zigzag line or traverse. With hunters, a stag beats up and down, when he runs first one way and then another.

A stroke; a striking; a blow, whether with the hand, or with a weapon.

A pulsation; as the beat of the pulse.

The rise or fall of the hand or foot, in regulating the divisions of time in music.

A transient grace-note in music, struck immediately before the note it is intended to ornament. In the military art, the beat of drum, is a succession of strokes varied, in different ways, for particular purposes; as to regulate a march to call soldiers to their arms or quarters, to direct an attack or retreat. The beat of a watch or clock, is the stroke made by the fangs or pallets of the spindle of the balance, or of the pads in a royal pendulum.