Defeated

How to spell defeated

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce defeated

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does defeated mean?

1. verbBeat or overcame an opponent in a contest, battle, or vote.
2. adjectiveShowing the dejection or hopelessness of someone who has been beaten.

Defeated in a sentence

• verb

  The home team defeated their rivals in the cup final.

• adjective

  He looked utterly defeated after the long day of rejected applications.

• verb

  The proposal was defeated by a narrow margin in the vote.

• adjective

  A defeated sigh escaped her as she closed the laptop.

Where does defeated come from?

Language of origin: French

This word traces back through Old French to Latin. The verb 'defeat' came into English in the late 1300s from the Old French 'desfait' or 'defait', the past participle of 'desfaire', which meant 'to undo' or 'to destroy'. That French verb was built from the Latin prefix 'dis-', meaning 'apart' or 'reverse', and 'facere', the everyday Latin verb 'to do' or 'to make'. So at its core the idea is of unmaking or undoing someone's effort, which is exactly what happens when an opponent is beaten. The same 'facere' root sits inside a huge family of English words such as 'factory', 'manufacture' and 'feat' itself, and the spelling 'feat' inside 'defeated' is a useful reminder that the middle is spelled 'eat', not 'eet'.

How the word is built

• de- (from Latin dis-: un-, reverse)
• feat (root from facere: to do, make)
• -ed (past tense/participle suffix)