bemuse

present singular third person bemuses · participle present bemusing · participle past bemused · past bemused

1. transitiveTo confuse or bewilder.

   [With] fairy tales bemused the shepherd lies.

   1771, James Foot, Penseroso

   2 more examples

   the bad metaphysics with which they bemuse themselves

   1847, Hugh Miller, First Impressions of England and its people

   With regard to definition-writing students, as a result of having spent years padding out written assignments in order to meet word-length requirements, were somewhat bemused to be told that fewer words were better than a long, wordy definition.

   2015, James Lambert, “Lexicography as a teaching tool: A Hong Kong case study”, in Lan Li, Jamie McKeown, Liming Liu, editors, Dictionaries and corpora: Innovations in reference science. Proceedings of ASIALEX 2015 Hong Kong, Hong Kong: The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, page 146

2. proscribedsometimestransitiveTo be amused, especially sardonically.
3. archaichumorousTo devote to the Muses.

   When those incorrigible things, Poets, are once irrecoverably Be-mus'd

   1705, Alexander Pope, Letters

4. obsoleteslangtransitiveTo make drunk; to intoxicate.

   a parson much be-mus'd in beer

   1735, Alexander Pope, Satires of Dr. Donne versified

   2 more examples

   This old man generally bemused himself in beer, once a fortnight.

   1784, Edward Harwood, The Case of the Rev. Dr Harwood, page 27

   […] more innocently, and no doubt profitably, than if he had dined at a big-wig's board or bemused himself with smoke and beer among his brethren of the pen.

   1891, Grace L. Keith Johnston, The Halletts: A Country Town Chronicle, volume 3, page 34