Repressed

How to spell repressed

9 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce repressed

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does repressed mean?

1. verbHeld back or subdued a feeling, urge, or action by force of will.
2. adjectiveDescribing feelings or memories that are held back, or a person who restrains emotion.

Repressed in a sentence

• verb

  She repressed a yawn during the long budget meeting.

• adjective

  Years of therapy uncovered a deeply repressed memory from his childhood.

• verb

  The troops brutally repressed the uprising in a single night.

• adjective

  She came across as cold and emotionally repressed at work.

Where does repressed come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word grows from the Latin verb reprimere, which meant literally 'to press back' or 'to push down', built from the prefix re- meaning 'back' and premere meaning 'to press'. The past participle of that Latin verb was repressus, and it is this form that gave English the spelling with the doubled tail sound. The word entered English in the late 1300s through scholarly and legal Latin, first describing the act of physically holding something down or putting down a revolt. Over the centuries it broadened to cover holding back feelings, urges, and memories, and by the early twentieth century it carried a strong psychological flavour thanks to the language of Freud and psychoanalysis. The very same premere root quietly survives in everyday relatives such as 'press', 'compress', and 'express', which can help you remember that the heart of the word really is press with a re- in front and a plain -ed on the end.

How the word is built

• re- (back)
• press (root, from Latin premere: to press)
• -ed (past tense/adjective suffix)