Deprecate
verb ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 To express disapproval of, protest or plead against. transitive
"They deprecated the attempt to deny aid to homeless people."
- 2 belittle wordnet
- 3 To belittle, depreciate. transitive
"He deprecates any praise of his own merits."
- 4 express strong disapproval of; deplore wordnet
- 5 To declare something obsolescent; to recommend against a function, technique, command, etc. that still works but has been replaced. transitive
"The 'bold' tag has been deprecated in favour of the 'strong' tag."
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- 6 To pray against. archaic, transitive
"And in deprecating of Evil, we make an humble Acknowledgement of Guilt; and of God’s Juſtice in chaſtizing, as well as Clemency, in ſparing the Guilty."
- 7 To regret deeply. archaic, transitive
Example
More examples"They deprecated the attempt to deny aid to homeless people."
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin dēprecātus, perfect active participle of dēprecor (“to pray against (a present or impending evil) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), pray for, intercede for (that which is in danger), rarely imprecate”), from dē- (“off”) + precor (“to pray”).
Related phrases
More for "deprecate"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.