menace
English edit
Pronunciation edit
Etymology 1 edit
From Middle English manace, from Old French manace, menace, &c., from Late Latin minācia (“threat, menace”), from Latin mināx (“threatening”) + -ia (suffix forming abstract nouns).
Noun edit
menace (plural menaces)
- A perceived threat or danger. [a. 1300]
- 1697, Virgil, “The Ninth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
- the dark menace of the distant war.
- The act of threatening.
- (informal) An annoying and bothersome person or thing.
Synonyms edit
Derived terms edit
Translations edit
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References edit
- “menace, n.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2nd Ed.; 1989]
Etymology 2 edit
First attested in 1303: from Middle English manacen, from Old French menacer, manecier, manechier and Anglo-Norman manasser, from the assumed Vulgar Latin *mināciāre, from Latin minācia, whence the noun.
Verb edit
menace (third-person singular simple present menaces, present participle menacing, simple past and past participle menaced) (transitive, intransitive)
- (transitive) To make threats against (someone); to intimidate.
- to menace a country with war
- c. 1591–1595 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]:
- My master […] did menace me with death.
- 1788 June, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, “Mr. Sheridan’s Speech, on Summing Up the Evidence on the Second, or Begum Charge against Warren Hastings, Esq., Delivered before the High Court of Parliament, June 1788”, in Select Speeches, Forensick and Parliamentary, with Prefatory Remarks by N[athaniel] Chapman, M.D., volume I, [Philadelphia, Pa.]: Published by Hopkins and Earle, no. 170, Market Street, published 1808, →OCLC, page 474:
- The Begums' ministers, on the contrary, to extort from them the disclosure of the place which concealed the treasures, were, […] after being fettered and imprisoned, led out on to a scaffold, and this array of terrours proving unavailing, the meek tempered Middleton, as a dernier resort, menaced them with a confinement in the fortress of Chunargar. Thus, my lords, was a British garrison made the climax of cruelties!
- To threaten (an evil to be inflicted).
- c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act III, scene ii:
- Upon his browes was pourtraid vgly death,
And in his eies the furies of his heart,
That ſhine as Comets, menacing reueng,
And caſts a pale complexion on his cheeks.
- 1613 (date written), William Shakespeare, [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:
- By oath he menaced / Revenge upon the cardinal.
- To endanger (someone or something); to imperil or jeopardize.
Translations edit
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References edit
- “menace, v.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2nd Ed.; 1989]
French edit
Etymology edit
Inherited from Old French manace, from Latin minācia (“threat”), a noun based on mināx (“threatening”).
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
menace f (plural menaces)
Related terms edit
Verb edit
menace
- inflection of menacer:
Further reading edit
- “menace”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Friulian edit
Etymology edit
From Latin minācia (“threat”), possibly via Italian minaccia or another Romance language.
Noun edit
menace f (plural menacis)
Related terms edit
Middle English edit
Verb edit
menace
- Alternative form of manacen
Spanish edit
Verb edit
menace
- inflection of menazar: