brazen

Meaning

1. Made of brass.
2. Brass-like in appearance or character; bright, ruddy, hard.
3. Sounding harsh and loud, like brass cymbals or brass instruments.
4. Extremely strong; impenetrable; resolute.
5. Shameless or impudent; shocking or audacious; brash.
6. To turn a brass color.
7. Generally followed by out or through: to carry through in a brazen manner; to act boldly despite embarrassment, risk, etc.

Etymology / origin

From Middle English brasen, from Old English bræsen (“brazen, of brass”); equivalent to brass + -en (compare golden, wooden, etc.). The word originally meant “of brass”; the figurative verb sense (as in brazen it out (“face impudently”)) dates from the 1550s (perhaps evoking the sense “face like brass, unmoving and not showing shame”), and the adjective sense “impudent” from the 1570s. Compare brass neck, bold as brass.

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