revenge
Verbrevenges, revenging, revenged
Formsrevenges, revenging, revenged
- 1Personal, retaliatory action taken against a person, group, or institution for a real or perceived wrong.
He spent years plotting revenge against the company that fired him.
Their revenge took the form of a public lawsuit.
Similarpayback
Oppositeforgiveness
Note
Behind the noun stands a family of French verbs, and possibly an Old Occitan revènge meaning both "revenge" and "comeback," from revenir, "to come back." That idea of a blow returned still sits close to the surface. In use the word is usually uncountable and keeps fixed company: people act in revenge or wreak revenge on someone, and in casual speech they call it payback.
- 2To take retaliatory action for a particular harmful act, or on behalf of its victim; to avenge.
The knight vowed to revenge the murder of his lord.
They revenged their fallen comrades with a swift counterattack.
Similaravenge
Oppositeforgive
Note
The object can be either the wrong or the person wronged. One revenges a death, a loss, a cause, or, as Leigh Hunt has it, revenges a man "finely on his two principal enemies," with the target of the retaliation following on. In this double reach it matches avenge. It also carries easily into sport: a team revenges a defeat by winning the next meeting.
- 3To carry out one's own retaliation on or upon a particular person.
He revenged himself on the men who had ruined his name.
She vowed to revenge herself upon those who had wronged her.
Similaravenge
Note
Here the revenger is also the object: you revenge yourself, and the person who pays follows with on or upon. Shakespeare's Julius Caesar shows the pattern: "Revenge yourselves alone on Cassius." Keep it distinct from revenging a wrong or victim. Revenging yourself names who acts, while revenging a murder names what is being answered.
- 4A victory over an opponent who previously defeated you.
Saturday's match gave the club its long-awaited revenge over its biggest rival.
After last season's defeat, this win tasted of revenge.
Similarpayback
Note
The scoreboard version, where the wrong is simply an earlier defeat. Here the Occitan "comeback" behind the retaliatory noun comes into its own. It pairs with have and seek: in W. B. M. Ferguson's Zollenstein (1908) a card player promises his opponent "sevenfold revenge," and the beaten villain of Star Trek: Voyager's Bride of Chaotica! (1999) vows to "seek my revenge." Nothing more hostile is meant than a rematch won.
Less common meaning
- 5To take vengeance; to retaliate for a wrong suffered.
The kinsmen gathered, resolved to revenge before nightfall.
a bird that will revenge upon you all
c. 1591, William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt,”Note
An older pattern with no object at all: one simply revenges, often with upon, as in Shakespeare's Third Part of Henry the Sixth, "a bird that will revenge upon you all." It now reads as archaic. In current prose, use the reflexive construction (revenge oneself on someone), or use avenge or take revenge, so the sentence does not look as if its object went missing.
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Origins
From Middle French revenge, formed from revenger, from Old French revengier (possibly influenced by Old Occitan revènge, "revenge, comeback"). It is related to the Old French forms vengier and venchier, both descended from Latin vindicō.
From Middle English revengen, borrowed from the Old French verb revengier (also revenger).