bullied

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of bully.

   The manager bullied his staff into working unpaid overtime.

   Small suppliers say they have been bullied by the retail giant over prices.

   Note

   The y of bully turns to i before -ed, as in carried or worried, and the one spelling serves as both the simple past (they bullied him) and the participle after have or be (he had been bullied for years). A useful pattern names what the pressure achieves with into: bullied into signing, bullied into silence.

2. 2
   adjective

   Having suffered at the hands of a bully.

   The program pairs bullied students with older mentors who check in every week.

   The most bullied kids in the class were the ones nobody sat with at lunch.

   Similarharassed, victimized

   Note

   As an adjective it takes degrees: one pupil can be more bullied than another, and a survey can single out the most bullied group. Before a noun (bullied children) it describes a condition; after was it may instead be the passive verb, reporting what someone did, and an agent with by gives that away: he was bullied by his brother.

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