Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- transitive verb To do better than (another) in a competition or battle; win victory over; beat.
- transitive verb To prevent the success of; thwart.
- transitive verb To frustrate the enforcement of (a motion, for example).
- transitive verb To make (an estate, for example) void; annul.
- transitive verb To dishearten or dispirit.
- transitive verb To be beyond the comprehension of; mystify.
- noun The act of defeating an opponent.
- noun The state of being defeated; failure to win.
- noun A coming to naught; frustration.
- noun The act of overcoming or frustrating the enforcement of.
- noun Law The act of making null and void.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun An undoing; ruin; destruction.
- noun In law, the act of annulling, or of rendering null and void; annulment: as, the defeat of a title.
- noun The act of depriving a person of something expected, desired, or striven for, by some antagonistic action or influence.
- noun The act or result of overcoming in a contest, viewed with reference to the person overcome; overthrow; vanquishment; rout: as, to inflict a severe defeat upon the enemy.
- To undo; do away with; deprive of vigor, prosperity, health, life, or value; ruin; destroy.
- [In the last extract there is perhaps an allusion to defeature, 2.]
- Specifically In law, to annul; render null and void: as, to
defeat a title to an estate. Seedefeasance , 3. - To deprive of something expected, desired, or striven for, by some antagonistic action or influence: applied to persons.
- To frustrate; prevent the success of; make of no effect; thwart: applied to things.
- To overcome in a contest of any kind, as a battle, fight, game, debate, competition, or election; vanquish; conquer; overthrow; rout; beat: as, to
defeat an army; to defeat an opposing candidate; to defeat one's opponent at chess. - Synonyms Beat, Overpower, Overwhelm, Defeat, Discomfit, Rout, Overthrow, conquer. Beat is a general, somewhat indefinite, but vigorous word, covering the others. Overpower and overwhelm are the least discreditable to the one that loses in the struggle; overpower is least permanent in its effects. To overpower is to overcome by superiority of strength or numbers, but the disadvantage may be changed by the arrival of reinforcements. To overwhelm is to bear down utterly, to sweep clear away by superior strength. Defeat is to overcome or get the better of in some kind of contest, and implies less discredit, but generally greater disaster, to the defeated party than beat: as, that army is considered beaten which withdraws from the field. Defeat implies a serious disadvantage, because it applies more often to large numbers engaged. Discomfit has fallen into comparative disuse, except in its secondary sense of foiling, etc.; in that it expresses a comparatively complete and mortifying defeat. Rout is to defeat and drive off the field in confusion. Overthrow is the most decisive and final of these words; it naturally applies only to great persons, concerns, armies, etc. See
conquer .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb obsolete To undo; to disfigure; to destroy.
- transitive verb To render null and void, as a title; to frustrate, as hope; to deprive, as of an estate.
- transitive verb To overcome or vanquish, as an army; to check, disperse, or ruin by victory; to overthrow.
- transitive verb To resist with success.
- noun obsolete An undoing or annulling; destruction.
- noun Frustration by rendering null and void, or by prevention of success.
- noun An overthrow, as of an army in battle; loss of a battle; repulse suffered; discomfiture; -- opposed to
victory .
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb To
overcome inbattle orcontest . - verb To
nullify ; toreduce , tonothing , thestrength of. - noun The act of defeating or being defeated.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb thwart the passage of
- verb win a victory over
- noun the feeling that accompanies an experience of being thwarted in attaining your goals
- noun an unsuccessful ending to a struggle or contest
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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The fact that so many evangelicals would rather see the recent HCR legislation, with its guarantee of ending the onerous “pre-existing condition” stuff, go down in defeat is a crisp and clear comment on the utter moral depravity of evangelicalism.
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Usually, what local parties do when certain defeat is in the offing is find some young up and comer and promise him or her the moon down the road in exchange for going down with the ship this time out.
Lance Mannion: 2008
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Usually, what local parties do when certain defeat is in the offing is find some young up and comer and promise him or her the moon down the road in exchange for going down with the ship this time out.
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What is really meant by the term defeat in the parlance of conventional military aims when facing a shadowy global terrorist network?
Sen. Robert Byrd: Has the Military Mission in Afghanistan Become Lost? 2009
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Menace in the pre-emptive smear that the only thing that could bring about an Obama defeat is the inherent racism of the American voters – a smear that potentially identifies all those who vote against him as public enemies.
Archive 2008-10-01 Not a sheep 2008
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Karzai gives us an honorable exit, unlike in Iraq, where our defeat is there for all to see and savour.
You Ain’t Gotta Go Home But You Gotta Get The Hell Up Outta Here | ATTACKERMAN 2008
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Some days I wonder whether many in the news media personally identify with Lieberman, so that his defeat is theirs.
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Since Washington's hostile and hawkish policies have always been against the Iranian nation, this defeat is actually an obvious victory for the Iranian nation.
Sound Politics: "Are Iraqi rebels cheering Dems big election wins?" 2006
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Furthermore, he said, "their defeat is an absolute certainty, as is our superiority, and all we have to do is assert it."
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On Capitol Hill, meanwhile, Democrats are hailing what they call a defeat for the Bush administration.
alexaguado123 commented on the word defeat
derrotar
September 17, 2013