Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Assassinate
As-sas′sin-ate
,Verb.
T.
[
imp. & p. p.
Assassinated
; p. pr. & vb. n.
Assassinating
.] [LL.
assassinatus
, p. p. of assassinare
.] 1.
To kill by surprise or secret assault; to murder by treacherous violence.
Help, neighbors, my house is broken open by force, and I am ravished, and like to be
assassinated
. Dryden.
2.
To assail with murderous intent; hence, by extended meaning, to maltreat exceedingly.
[Archaic]
Your rhymes
assassinate
our fame. Dryden.
Such usage as your honorable lords
Afford me,
Afford me,
assassinated
and betrayed. Milton.
Syn. – To kill; murder; slay. See
Kill
. As-sas′sin-ate
,Noun.
[F.
assassinat
.] 1.
An assassination, murder, or murderous assault.
[Obs.]
If I had made an
assassinate
upon your father. B. Jonson.
2.
An assassin.
[Obs.]
Dryden.
Webster 1828 Edition
Assassinate
ASSAS'SINATE
,Verb.
T.
1.
To kill or attempt to kill, by surprise or secret assault; to murder by sudden violence. Assassin as a verb is not now used.2.
To way lay; to take by treachery.ASSAS'SINATE
,Noun.
Definition 2024
assassinate
assassinate
English
Verb
assassinate (third-person singular simple present assassinates, present participle assassinating, simple past and past participle assassinated)
- To murder someone, especially an important person, by a sudden or obscure attack, especially for ideological or political reasons. [from 17th c.]
- 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essayes, London: Edward Blount, OCLC 946730821, II.29:
- The Assassines, a nation depending of Phœnicia, are esteemed among the Mahometists […]. And thus was our Earle Raymond of Tripoli murthered or assassinated (this word is borrowed from their name) in the middest of his Citie, during the time of our warres in the holy land […].
- 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essayes, London: Edward Blount, OCLC 946730821, II.29:
- (figuratively) To harm, ruin, or defame severely or destroy by treachery, slander, libel, or obscure attack.
- Dryden
- Your rhymes assassinate our fame.
- Milton
- Such usage as your honourable lords / Afford me, assassinated and betrayed.
- Dryden
Related terms
Translations
to murder by sudden or obscure attack
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Noun
assassinate (plural assassinates)
- (obsolete) Assassination, murder.
- (obsolete) An assassin.
- 1621, Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, vol.1, III.i.2:
- Yet again, many of them desperate hairbrains, rash, careless, fit to be assassinates, as being void of all fear and sorrow […].
- 1621, Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, vol.1, III.i.2:
Translations
assassination — see assassination
assassin — see assassin
See also
Italian
Verb
assassinate
- second-person plural present indicative of assassinare
- second-person plural imperative of assassinare
- feminine plural of assassinato