Withspeak

verb

verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To speak against; contradict. rare, transitive

    "How may I withspeak the hostile word or find an answer to my foes?"

Synonyms

All synonyms
contradictwithsaywithsay

Example

More examples

"How may I withspeak the hostile word or find an answer to my foes?"

Etymology

A revival of Middle English withspeken (“to speak against, contradict”), from Old English wiþsprecan (“to contradict, gainsay, revile”), from Proto-West Germanic *wiþisprekan, equivalent to with- + speak. Cognate with Old Frisian withspreka (“to disagree”), Saterland Frisian wierspreeke (“to contradict”), West Frisian wjersprekke (“to contradict”), Dutch weerspreken (“to contradict”), German widersprechen (“to contradict, gainsay”).

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.