Mistake
noun, verb ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 An error.
"There were too many mistakes in the test, that unfortunately you failed."
- 2 a wrong action attributable to bad judgment or ignorance or inattention wordnet
- 3 A pitch which was intended to be pitched in a hard-to-hit location, but instead ends up in an easy-to-hit place.
- 4 an understanding of something that is not correct wordnet
- 5 part of a statement that is not correct wordnet
- 1 To understand wrongly, taking one thing or person for another. transitive
"Sorry, I mistook you for my brother. You look very similar."
- 2 to make a mistake or be incorrect wordnet
- 3 To misunderstand (someone). obsolete, transitive
"Miſtake me not, my Lord, ’tis not my meaning / To raze one Title of your Honour out."
- 4 identify incorrectly wordnet
- 5 To commit an unintentional error; to do or think something wrong. intransitive, obsolete
"Impoſe me to what penance your inuention / Can lay vpon my ſinne, yet ſinn’d I not / But in miſtaking."
Show 1 more definition
- 6 To take or choose wrongly. obsolete, rare
"The better act of purposes mistook / Is to mistake again; though indirect, / Yet indirection thereby grows direct,"
Example
More examples"If you see a mistake, then please correct it."
Etymology
From Middle English mistaken, from Old Norse mistaka (“to take in error, to miscarry”); equivalent to mis- + take. Cognate with Icelandic mistaka (“to mistake”), Swedish missta (“to mistake”) (before apocope misstaga). The noun, which replaced earlier mistaking, is derived from the verb.