imprecate

English

Etymology

(deprecated template usage)

From Latin imprecari (“to invoke (good or evil) upon, pray to, call upon”), from in (“upon”) + precari (“to pray”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɪmpɹəkeɪt/

Verb

1. (transitive) To call down by prayer, as something hurtful or calamitous.
2. (transitive) To invoke evil upon; to curse; to swear at.
   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, chapter 119

     To sailors, oaths are household words; they will swear in the trance of the calm, and in the teeth of the tempest; they will imprecate curses from the topsail-yard-arms, when most they teeter over to a seething sea; [...]

Related terms

• imprecation

Translations

to call down by prayer

• Bulgarian: проклинам (bg) (proklinam)
• Russian: проклина́ть (ru) impf (proklinátʹ)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Spanish: imprecar (es)

to invoke evil upon

• Bulgarian: пожелавам зло (poželavam zlo)
• Latin: imprecor
• Occitan: imprecar, escomenjar
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Russian: проклина́ть (ru) impf (proklinátʹ)
• Spanish: imprecar (es)

Further reading

• “imprecate”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “imprecate”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “imprecate”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

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Italian

Verb

imprecate

1. inflection of imprecare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative
2. feminine plural of imprecato

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Latin

Participle

(deprecated template usage) imprecāte

1. vocative masculine singular of imprecātus