accusation
Pluralaccusations
- 1A statement claiming that a person has done something wrong, typically made before it has been proven.
The reporter's accusation against the senator dominated the headlines for weeks.
He dismissed her accusation as nothing more than office gossip.
Similarallegation, claim, charge
Note
The everyday sense, and the one adjectives gather around. An accusation can be ungrounded, blind or repeated, words that judge how well it stands up or how often it is made. The wrong being alleged follows of, as in an accusation of a crime. Unlike the courtroom charge, nothing formal has to stand behind it.
- 2The act of charging someone with wrongdoing or blaming a person for a fault.
The public accusation of the official set off a lengthy investigation.
His accusation came before anyone had heard the full story.
Similarcharge, allegation, denunciation, indictment
Note
The noun of action behind the others: accuse plus -ation. It reached English in the late 14th century through Old French acusacion, from Latin accūsātiō. Without an article it names the act itself, as when Shakespeare and Fletcher write in 1613 of coming "not by the way of accusation". With an article, or in the plural, it names a particular instance.
- 3A formal charge brought against a person before a court of law, stating the offense they are alleged to have committed.
The prosecutor outlined the accusation against the defendant in clear terms.
The accusation was formally entered into the court record before the trial began.
Similarcharge, indictment, allegation
Note
In legal use the word names the charge itself rather than the act of making it, and the Latin accūsātiō already meant "indictment". The King James Bible of 1611 shows how concrete that charge can be: "[They] set up over his head his accusation." There the charge is a written thing that can be put on display. Keep it apart from the everyday allegation, which needs no court behind it.
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Origin
First attested in the late 14th century, accusation came through Middle English accusacion and Old French acusacion from Latin accūsātiō ('accusation, indictment'), itself from accūsō ('to blame, accuse').