revile

From Middle English revilen, from re + Old French aviler (“to make vile or cheap, disprize, disesteem”), from a- (“to”) + vil (“vile, cheap”); see vile.

• IPA^(key): /ɹəˈvaɪl/
• Rhymes: -aɪl

  • Audio (Southern England):

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revile (third-person singular simple present reviles, present participle reviling, simple past and past participle reviled)

1. (ambitransitive) To attack (someone) with abusive language.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Peter 2:23:

     who, when he was reviled, reviled not again

   • c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]:

     And did not she herself revile me there?

   • 2011, Felix Hagan, “Vengeance On My Mind”, in Dawn Breaks, the Monster Wakes...:

     He turned and quivered like a child, this worthless man that I reviled. And at his anguish, I just smiled a grin of mastery.

• See Thesaurus:defame

revile (uncountable)

1. (obsolete) reproach; reviling
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

     The gracious Judge, without revile, replied.

• “revile”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “revile”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

• eviler, levier, liever, relive, veiler