/blunder/definition

blunder

-) Verb.

-) Pronunciation: blʌndə(r).

-) Etymology: of uncertain origin. In Middle English, it was blondren (= to stir, confuse). Samuel Johnson conjectured that it was derived from BLIND.

-) Third-person singular simple present: she (he) blunders. 

-) Preterite tense, preterite participle: blundered.

-) Present participle: blundering.

-) Intransitively: 1. (The subject being an animated being) a. To locomote (move from a place to another by walking, flying, crawling, etc.), clumsily, unsteadly, or stupidly, either from the lack of illumination, or from a visual disability or impotence. Hence: b. To locomote clumsily, unsteadly, or stupidly, either from fatigue or from other non-visual causes (overweigh, drunkenness, impediment, etc.).

-) Synonyms: to flounder, stumble.

-) Translation: tropezar, in Spanish; inciampare, in Italian; buter, in French.

The travellers continued, for many days, to experience great difficulties and discomforts from this wide conflagration […]. The sun was for a great part of the time obscured by the smoke, and the loftiest mountains were hidden from view. Blundering along in this region of mist and uncertainty, they were frequently obliged to make long circuits, to avoid obstacles which they could not perceive until close upon them.

Irving… Captain Bonneville

[…] obstacles to their progress occurred in the shape of strong doors, party-walls, and iron-grates —so that the party blundered on in the dark, uncertain whether they were not going farther from, rather than approaching, the extremity of the labyrinth.

Scott… Woodstock

[…] the men who drove them could scarcely escape the troopers who waited them, if they blundered on through the darkness of the bush.

Bindloss… Winston of the Prairie

Seaforth's limbs were too stiff to be much use to him yet, and he blundered amidst the boulders, falling over one or two, before he reached the shingle where they had partly drawn out the canoe.

Harold Bindloss… Alton of Somasco

The masquerader, whose ambition it will be to simulate the barbarous fantasticalities of the Sasquesahanocks, need not blunder in his costume.

Simms… Captain John Smith

He felt something thrusting against him. He was being pushed along the gallery. Someone was shouting--it might be at him. He was too confused to hear. He was thrust against the wall, and a number of people blundered past him. It seemed to him that his guards were struggling with one another.

Wells… The Sleeper Awakes

[…] I ducked at once under water, and, holding my breath until movement was an agony, blundered painfully ahead under the surface as long as I could. 

Wells… The War of the Worlds

The tired horses blundered heavily along the stony streets, and crossed more than one bridge.

Braddon… London Pride

They knew the way home, and after I had blundered about in search of them through the lampshot darkness, I settled myself to walk back at my leisure, comfortably sure that I should find them on the verandah waiting for me when I reached the hotel.

Howells… An Open-Eyed Conspiracy

Most ridiculous of all was the condition of one old fellow, who had found a calabash containing palm wine, and, eagerly drinking it, was immediately fitted with a mask, for the shell stuck to his forehead and whiskers, of course covering his eyes; and he blundered about, cutting the wildest capers in his efforts to get rid of the encumbrance.

Jean Wyss… The Swiss Family Robinson

-) With the preposition against + a noun designative of the obstacle:

She looked at me, shook off a bee that had blundered against her apron, and looked at me again.

Arthur Quiller-Couch… The Delectable Duchy

The tongue of the bell had rung its last alarm, when a hot and hasty traveller, encumbered by a cloak and carpet-bag, sprang from the wharf to the deck of the Spitfire, and in so doing blundered against a gentleman who was standing near the gangway.

Married by Mistake, in American Monthly Magazine, vol. IX

A bat, more blinded than Ruth herself by the glaring picture which had suddenly come out of the blank darkness, flew low, and blundered against her face.

Harriet Martineau… The parish

[…] Towser blundered against the leg of the table so that it almost tumbled over; and a terrible clatter followed among the cups.

Amory… The Young Rover

Turning the corner I blundered against Sir Doomsday. The concussion was violent, the baronet stumbled into the gutter.

Motley… Morton’s Hope

On and on we went, in wearisome darkness and in seemingly interminable space; half-asleep and stumbling, our men blundered against each other.

Stepney… Leaves from the diary…

The bees had been so thirsty that they had drank too much red clover wine, for they blundered against each other, and staggered and tumbled about with aimless indecision of place and purpose, and evidently did not know a corncockel from a dandelion.

Oddfellow’s magazine, vol. 2

-) With the preposition on, or upon + a noun designative of either the obstacle or the place accidentally trodden:

They soon came upon the enemy's advanced guard, a battalion encamped behind a log breastwork. The French set fire to their camp, and retreated. The columns kept their form, and pressed forward, but, through ignorance of their guides, became bewildered in a dense forest, […] and blundered upon each other.

Irving… George Washington

[…] that young fellow that blundered on my brig in the dark.

Joseph Conrad… The Rescue

I avoided the Middletons as much as possible, as well as everybody else who was likely to prove an acquaintance in common. Not aware of their being in town, however, I blundered on Sir John, I believe, the first day of his coming, and the day after I had called at Mrs. Jennings's.

Austen… Sense and Sensibility

Evidently the driver, whoever he was, well knew what he was about, and had not blundered upon this place by accident.

Rex Beach… Heart of the Sunset

Tiptoeing cautiously forward behind their leader, the other two lads perceived that they had blundered upon a spot in which several horses had been left unguarded by the search parties, while they pushed their way on foot through the impenetrable brush.

Fremont Deering… The Border Boys…

We shall certainly be pursued, and although our foes cannot see us well in the dark, some out of their number are likely to blunder upon us.

Joseph Altsheler… The Masters of the Peaks

-) With the preposition into + a noun designative of either the obstacle or the place accidentally trodden:

I had a vague idea of going on to my own house, and that was as much motive as I had. I staggered through the trees, fell into a ditch and bruised my knees against a plank, and finally splashed out into the lane […]. I say splashed, for the storm water was sweeping the sand down the hill in a muddy torrent. There in the darkness a man blundered into me and sent me reeling back.

Wells… The War of the Worlds

[…] the man was in their way as a wasp that has blundered into an ants' nest; and, while frightened at the size of the intruder, these honest ants were resolved to get him out of their citadel alive or dead.

Bulwer-Lytton… What Will He Do With It

[…] someone, coming, it may be, in a transverse direction, blundered violently into him. He was hurling down a staircase in absolute darkness. He reeled, and was struck again, and came against a wall with his hands.

Wells… The Sleeper Awakes

The furniture was unfamiliar; the room, too, had an altered look; a young clerk —a stranger— was at the desk! I uttered an exclamation, apologetic in its character, for I thought, at first, I had blundered into the wrong office.

Harper’s new monthly magazine, vol. 12

-) With the preposition over + a noun designative of either the obstacle or the thing over which one is fallen:

The housemaid was the only being stirring in the morning when little Mr. Binnie blundered over her pail as she was washing the deck.

Thackeray… The New Comes

-) 2. Metaphorical phrasal uses: (by analogy with the preceding ones):

-) a. To blunder into: to chance to be in a state, action, process, circumstance; this is, to come to be accidentally in something factual or circumstantial, as if in consequence of having strayed..

He never blundered into victory, but won his battles in his head, before he won them on the field.

Emerson… Representative Men

He represents the sultan as residing in Bablyon, and blunders into pedantic confusion between Babylon in Egypt, and Babylon in Chaldea.

Robert Kerr… Voyages and Travels

-) b. To blunder upon (something): to come to know, find or experience it accidentally:

I wonder how the pupils of these schools, and the children of such parents, blunder into so much knowledge as they do.

Misses Mendell… Notes of travel

[…] some fool would have blundered into the discovery, if you had not prevented him.

William Fowle… The hundred dialogues 1854

These bizarre attempts at explanation were followed by others equally bizarre. Of late years however, an anonymous writer, by a course of reasoning exceedingly unphilosophical, has contrived to blunder upon a […] solution--although we cannot consider it altogether the true one.

Edgar Poe

While reading this passage, I felt my uncle's hand tremble in mine, and I laid down the book. It appeared as if everything I did, instead of soothing, as I intended, but pained him more and more. I sat silent, with tears in my eyes, fearful that if I attempted further kindness, I should but blunder upon some wrong method of showing it. 

Jane Campbell… Evenings at Home

Last season I blundered upon an experiment, with the results of which I feel highly satisfied.

The New England farmer, vol. 7

-) 3. Metaphorical acceptation: to commit an error in doing something, originally through confusion or indistinction; later, through any cause.

Whenever I have found out that I have blundered, or that my work has been imperfect, and when I have been contemptuously criticised, and even when I have been overpraised, […], it has been my greatest comfort to say hundreds of times to myself that "I have worked as hard and as well as I could, and no man can do more than this."

Darwin… The Autobiography

I had a long conversation with the new Lord Sheffield; and, as I had never seen him since he was Colonel Holroyd, I was ridiculously enough embarrassed with his new title, blundering from my lord to sir, and from sir to my lord.

Frances Burney… Diary and letters

-) With the preposition in + a noun or a gerund, which stand for the scope of the error:

Mr. Arbuton began to write. Suddenly, "Miss Ellison," said he, with a smile, "I've blundered in your name; I neglected to put the Miss before it […]."

Howells… A Chance Acquaintance

[…] he blundered in making his corrections.

Graham’s American monthly magazine…, vol. 45

If it be true that experienced geologists have sometimes, from the neglect of palaeontology, blundered in the arrangement of the physical groups; it is equally true, that very expert palaeontologists, from some mistake of arrangement among the physical groups, have sometimes blundered in their palaeontology.

A. Sedgwick… A synopsis of the classification…

-) With the preposition about + a noun:

He is as fond of quotations as my poor "Lady Smatter," and, like her, knows little beyond a song, and always blunders about the author of that.

Frances Burney… Diary and letters

[…] I think you will allow that it is more likely you may have blundered about the identity of a lady to whom you have never spoken, than that the daughter of Sir Christopher Harrington, and my greatly esteemed young cousin, should be living in the manner you mentioned.

The Eclectic magazine, vol. 6

-) Transitively: 1. Obsolete: a. To confuse (two or more bodies); to mix confusedly. b. To confound mentally; to unreason (someone). 

-) 2. (The object is one’s way, this is, my way, your way, etc.) to locomote staggeringly; go totteringly. Also metaphorical.

A guide was absolutely needed, as the track ceased altogether in one place, and for some time the horses had to blunder their way along a bright, rushing river, swirling rapidly downwards, heavily bordered with bamboo, full of deep holes, and made difficult by trees which have fallen across it.

Isabella Bird… Unbeaten Tracks in Japan

Away, […] did they scramble, through bush and brake, […], nor did they pause to breathe, until they had blundered their way through this perilous wood and had fairly reached the high-road to the city.

Irving… Tales of a Traveller

[…] he would sit, silent […], for half an hour or half a minute, as the case might be, and then get up suddenly, with a “Well, good morning,” shuffle back to the door, and blunder his way out.

Douglas Jerrold’s shilling magazine, vol. 1

His face now became very troubled, the tone of his voice very irresolute,—the face and the voice of a man who is either blundering his way through an intricate falsehood, or through obscure reminiscences.

Edward Bulwer-Lytton… A Strange Story

-) 3. To pronounce or utter (something) blunderingly or stupidly. It is usually construed with the adverb out, in a pleonastic construction:

I was blundering out some kind of apology for my appearance, when he pointed to a chair, and begged me to be seated.

Charles Lever… The Daltons

Cecilia could not forbear laughing to hear the truth thus accidentally blundered out.

Frances Burney… Cecilia

Jo produced her manuscript and, blushing redder and redder with each sentence, blundered out fragments of the little speech carefully prepared for the occasion.

Alcott… Little Women

-) 4. To cause (something or someone) to result into a unexpected state or circumstance by clumsy or stupid behavior. 

I have found worth, probity, and even sincerity among courtiers themselves, and the very patrons I had offended had their good qualities, which I did not respect the less because I had blundered myself out of their favour.

Robert Ward… De Vere

-) 5. To make a blunder or error in (something that one is doing); to do blunderingly; to vary (something) by error.

-) Synonym: bungle.

The banker's clerk, who was directed to sum my cash-account, blundered it three times.  

Scott… Waverly novels, vol. 5

Inscriptions, blundered by the die engraver, are frequently found both on the coins of classical antiquity, and of the middle ages.

H. Humpreys… The Coin Collector’s Manual

The appellations, and sobriquets, of the Scotish kings, and of the royal family, were obviously Irish, however they may have been blundered by copyists, or barbarized by translators.

George Chalmers… Caledonia

The value of the medal is lowered when any of the letters of the legend are misplaced, as a suspicion of forgery is thereby induced. A similar or even greater diminution in value occurs with respect to such coins as have not been well fixed in the dye, which has occasioned their slipping under the strokes of the hammer, and thus making a double or triple image. Many specimens have been found, on which the one side is perfectly well formed, but the other blundered in the manner just mentioned.

James Elmes… Dictionary of the fine arts  

-) English words derived from the verb BLUNDER: blunderful, blundersome, blunder (noun), blundered, blunderer, blunderhead, blundering, blunderingly, blundersome.