PROVOKES

Verb

provokes

Third-person singular simple present indicative form of provoke

Source: Wiktionary


PROVOKE

Pro*voke", v. t. [imp. & p. p. Provoked; p. pr. & vb. n. Provoking.] Etym: [F. provoquer, L. provocare to call forth; pro forth + vocare to call, fr. vox, vocis, voice, cry, call. See Voice.]

Definition: To call forth; to call into being or action; esp., to incense to action, a faculty or passion, as love, hate, or ambition; hence, commonly, to incite, as a person, to action by a challenge, by taunts, or by defiance; to exasperate; to irritate; to offend intolerably; to cause to retaliate. Obey his voice, provoke him not. Ex. xxiii. 21. Ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath. Eph. vi. 4. Such acts Of contumacy will provoke the Highest To make death in us live. Milton. Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust Gray. To the poet the meaning is what he pleases to make it, what it provokes in his own soul. J. Burroughs.

Syn.

– To irritate; arouse; stir up; awake; excite; incite; anger. See Irritate.

Pro*voke", v. i.

1. To cause provocation or anger.

2. To appeal.

Note: [A Latinism] [Obs.] Dryden.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition



RESET




Word of the Day

18 May 2025

OBLIQUE

(adjective) slanting or inclined in direction or course or position--neither parallel nor perpendicular nor right-angled; “the oblique rays of the winter sun”; “acute and obtuse angles are oblique angles”; “the axis of an oblique cone is not perpendicular to its base”


coffee icon

Coffee Trivia

In 1884, Angelo Moriondo of Turin, Italy, demonstrated the first working example of an espresso machine.

coffee icon