DictionaryAI

ashamed

uh-SHAYMD/əˈʃeɪmd/

2 meanings of ashamed

Practice

  1. 1
    adjective
    Feeling shame or guilt because of something you have done or failed to do.

    She was ashamed of the way she had treated her coworkers during the dispute.

    Many of the soldiers felt ashamed to ask for the help they so clearly needed.

    Similarembarrassed, guilty, sheepish, mortified, remorseful

    Oppositeproud, unashamed, shameless

    Note

    An adjective that began life as a verb form: Old English āsċamod was the past participle of āsċamian, "to be ashamed", built from a- + shame + -ed. It compares with more ashamed and most ashamed, never with -er and -est. Horace Mann's 1859 "Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity" shows its most forceful construction: ashamed to, followed by what one should not yet do.

  2. 2
    verb
    Simple past and past participle of ashame. Archaic; in current English ashamed is an adjective.
    Note

    The verb behind this form survives only at the edges of English. Intransitive ashame, "to feel shame", is obsolete, and transitive ashame, "to make ashamed", is rare. A sentence like "the defeat ashamed the commander" is grammatical but marked, and plain shamed says the same thing. The everyday word is the adjective, which grew out of this very participle.

Use it in a sentence

Write your own sentence with ashamed, and AI will tell you whether it fits and which meaning you used.

Origin

From Middle English ashamed, from Old English āsċamod, the past participle of āsċamian ("to be ashamed"). It is formed from a- plus shame plus -ed.