dumbbell

• dumb-bell, dumbell (rare)

From dumb (“silent”) +‎ bell.

• IPA^(key): /ˈdʌm.bɛl/

• Audio (Canada):

  (file)

dumbbell (plural dumbbells)

1. A weight training implement consisting of a short bar with weight counterpoised on each end.
   • 1997, Pete McDonald, Climbing Lessons: Inside Outdoor Education, page 40:

     He also had a room strewn with the toys of the trade and what-have-you: ropes and ironmongery, buoyancy aid and bagpipes, fetid socks and half-eaten haggises, dumbbells and ski-instructor sweaters.

   • 2007, “The Years before the End of the War”, in A Girl From Shanghai: The Story of Lillian Hsu, a Medical Geneticist, a NTU Medical College Alumna‎^[1], →ISBN, →OCLC, pages 35–36:

     On the map Gansu is shaped like a dumbbell lying obliquely from east to west. Its best known city is Lanjhou, the capital, and also the gateway to the Silk Road. But we did not go there; we were heading for a relatively unknown city a few hundred miles away from Lanjhou, called Tianshuei.

2. (obsolete) A bell with no clapper, used as bell-striking practice or to strike as a form of physical exercise
3. (derogatory, slang) A stupid person.
   • 2015, Floyd Merrell, Enigmas: Gold Fever, Space-Time Warps, Sierra Madre Magic:

     That's fool's gold, you dumbbell. Iron pyrite. Nobody would give you a dime for a ton of it.

• → Japanese: ダンベル (danberu)
• → Korean: 덤벨 (deombel)

• barbell
• kettlebell