See Bess in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
{
"derived": [
{
"_dis1": "0 0",
"word": "Bessbrook"
},
{
"_dis1": "0 0",
"word": "Bessie"
},
{
"_dis1": "0 0",
"word": "Bessy"
}
],
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "Elizabeth",
"nocap": "1"
},
"expansion": "clipping of Elizabeth",
"name": "clipping"
}
],
"etymology_text": "Variant of Beth, a clipping of Elizabeth.",
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Bess",
"name": "en-proper noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "name",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English diminutives of female given names",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English female given names",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English given names",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"_dis": "63 37",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English calculator words",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "80 20",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "80 20",
"kind": "other",
"name": "Pages with 1 entry",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
},
{
"_dis": "87 13",
"kind": "other",
"name": "Pages with entries",
"parents": [],
"source": "w+disamb"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
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12,
17
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],
"ref": "c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene vi], page 172, column 2:",
"text": "Come hither Beſſe, and let me kiſſe my Boy: […]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
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66,
70
],
[
196,
200
],
[
341,
345
]
],
"ref": "1981, William Wharton, Dad, Knopf, →ISBN, page 293:",
"text": "\"Jack, couldn't you call me Bette again? You know how much I hate Bess. I don't know what's happened; you've been calling me Bette since we came to California and now, suddenly, you're calling me Bess.\"\nThere's a long silence. Dad's still up on his knees; I'm driving along Sepulveda Boulevard toward Olympic.\n\"Well, Bette, I married you as Bess and I've always liked that name. It's a name you don't hear very often; it's a strong name like you. Every time I call you Bette I'm afraid somebody else might answer.\"",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A diminutive of the female given name Elizabeth."
],
"id": "en-Bess-en-name-8s3LiQ2t",
"links": [
[
"diminutive",
"diminutive"
],
[
"given name",
"given name"
],
[
"Elizabeth",
"Elizabeth#English"
]
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{
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"name": "English terms with collocations",
"parents": [],
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"examples": [
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13,
17
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],
"tags": [
"collocation"
],
"text": "Listen here, Bess.",
"type": "example"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A term applied to a fellow gay man, usually preceding an admonition."
],
"id": "en-Bess-en-name-3GQmRQch",
"links": [
[
"gay",
"gay"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(gay slang) A term applied to a fellow gay man, usually preceding an admonition."
],
"tags": [
"slang"
],
"topics": [
"LGBT"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"enpr": "bĕs"
},
{
"ipa": "/bɛs/"
},
{
"audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Bess.wav",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/f/f1/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/f/f1/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav.ogg"
},
{
"rhymes": "-ɛs"
}
],
"word": "Bess"
}
{
"categories": [
"English calculator words",
"English clippings",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English proper nouns",
"English uncountable nouns",
"Pages with 1 entry",
"Pages with entries",
"Rhymes:English/ɛs",
"Rhymes:English/ɛs/1 syllable"
],
"derived": [
{
"word": "Bessbrook"
},
{
"word": "Bessie"
},
{
"word": "Bessy"
}
],
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "Elizabeth",
"nocap": "1"
},
"expansion": "clipping of Elizabeth",
"name": "clipping"
}
],
"etymology_text": "Variant of Beth, a clipping of Elizabeth.",
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Bess",
"name": "en-proper noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "name",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English diminutives of female given names",
"English female given names",
"English given names",
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],
"examples": [
{
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"ref": "c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene vi], page 172, column 2:",
"text": "Come hither Beſſe, and let me kiſſe my Boy: […]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
66,
70
],
[
196,
200
],
[
341,
345
]
],
"ref": "1981, William Wharton, Dad, Knopf, →ISBN, page 293:",
"text": "\"Jack, couldn't you call me Bette again? You know how much I hate Bess. I don't know what's happened; you've been calling me Bette since we came to California and now, suddenly, you're calling me Bess.\"\nThere's a long silence. Dad's still up on his knees; I'm driving along Sepulveda Boulevard toward Olympic.\n\"Well, Bette, I married you as Bess and I've always liked that name. It's a name you don't hear very often; it's a strong name like you. Every time I call you Bette I'm afraid somebody else might answer.\"",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A diminutive of the female given name Elizabeth."
],
"links": [
[
"diminutive",
"diminutive"
],
[
"given name",
"given name"
],
[
"Elizabeth",
"Elizabeth#English"
]
]
},
{
"categories": [
"English gay slang",
"English terms with collocations"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
13,
17
]
],
"tags": [
"collocation"
],
"text": "Listen here, Bess.",
"type": "example"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A term applied to a fellow gay man, usually preceding an admonition."
],
"links": [
[
"gay",
"gay"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(gay slang) A term applied to a fellow gay man, usually preceding an admonition."
],
"tags": [
"slang"
],
"topics": [
"LGBT"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"enpr": "bĕs"
},
{
"ipa": "/bɛs/"
},
{
"audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Bess.wav",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/f/f1/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/f/f1/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-Bess.wav.ogg"
},
{
"rhymes": "-ɛs"
}
],
"word": "Bess"
}
Download raw JSONL data for Bess meaning in English (3.0kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-12-31 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-12-20 using wiktextract (e97c820 and 9905b1f). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.