noun

• 1Physical strength in contrast to intelligence.

  ‘commando work required as much brain as brawn’

  More example sentences

  • ‘Their strength and brawn have always put Tipp off a bit.’
  • ‘I suddenly saw these guys around me gaining this muscle, strength, and brawn.’
  • ‘On exams that measure brawn and physical aptitude, your score is not fixed - it can improve over time.’
  • ‘And you have the intelligence of a T-rex by the way, all brawn and no brain.’
  • ‘Tired of carefully scripted shows, viewers welcome a touch of reality through localized versions of Western programs that pit ordinary people against each other in contests of brain and brawn.’
  • ‘At a recent meeting, organised by its sub-zonal headquarters here, it trained 100 youths to become catalysts of change by making the best combination of brain and brawn.’
  • ‘But with anything competitive, the glory comes in the effort and hard work put in by one's own brain and brawn, and not by manipulation of the other characters.’
  • ‘‘I think the balance of brain and brawn has to be correct,’ Johnson said.’
  • ‘You're like the Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Man - you already have what you're looking for in spades, be it brains, brawn or heart.’
  • ‘He started playing chess as a child with his mother and siblings and is today an international name in the game which needs more brain than brawn.’
  • ‘Now that we're all a little older and a little wiser we're on the lookout for men with more brains than brawn - although a bit of both is the best combination.’
  • ‘It's that despite all of this, she knows how to throw out a genuinely good electronic album that is more fun than fantastical, more brain than brawn.’
  • ‘So all the kids should be trained from nursery level itself to become rough and tough to overpower the kidnappers through both brawn and brain.’
  • ‘Put them together, though, and you've got a downhill firecracker with brawn and brains.’
  • ‘An old adage says ‘brains before brawn,’ but what if the two are held in perfect equality?’
  • ‘Football is an interesting battle of brain as well as brawn and in the final term significant changes evolved in each team.’
  • ‘Not all types of migrants are welcome, however, since these countries need more brains than brawn.’
  • ‘He is a clever and levelheaded warrior, who knows when brawn is better than brain.’
  • ‘That's a healthy gathering for a sport which demands an unusual mix of brawn and brains, in roughly equal parts, and which, perhaps as a consequence, means that it is often misunderstood by the wider sporting public.’
  • ‘Today, perspiration triumphed over inspiration, style over sinew, brawn over brain, athletics over aesthetics, attrition over attraction and haymakers over playmakers.’

  Synonyms

  physical strength, muscle, muscles, muscular strength, muscularity, brawniness, burliness, huskiness, robustness, toughness, powerfulness, might, mightiness, lustiness

  View synonyms

• 2British Meat from a pig's or calf's head that is cooked and pressed in a pot with jelly.

  North American term headcheese

  ‘a slice of brawn’

  More example sentences

  • ‘pork brawn’
  • ‘Medieval English pork recipes included pies, brawn, and little rissoles.’
  • ‘The principal part of the pig used to make Pork Brawn is the head.’
  • ‘If you hanker for a taste of the past and have time on your hands, try his take on the old traditional favourite of jellied brawn’
  • ‘One dish his grandfather was particularly proud of was brawn - pig's head with jelly.’
  • ‘Generally, anything which is potted and made of various odds and ends of meat gets called brawn in our house, though.’