Persiflate
verb ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 To engage in persiflage; to banter. intransitive, rare, transitive
"We talked and persifflated all the way to London; and the idea of her will help me to a good chapter, in which I will make Pendennis and Blanche play at being in love, such a wicked false humbugging love, as two blase London People might act, and half deceive themselves that they were in earnest."
Example
More examples"We talked and persifflated all the way to London; and the idea of her will help me to a good chapter, in which I will make Pendennis and Blanche play at being in love, such a wicked false humbugging love, as two blase London People might act, and half deceive themselves that they were in earnest."
Etymology
Borrowed from French persifler, persiffler, or formed from persiflage + -ate (verb-forming suffix). Coined by British novelist William Makepeace Thackeray in 1850 (see quotation below).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.