PUNISH • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Punish

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/pˈənɪʃ/ Listen

verb

Punish v. t. (past & past part. punished; pres. part. punishing)

To impose a penalty upon; to afflict with pain, loss, or suffering for a crime or fault, either with or without a view to the offender's amendment; to cause to suffer in retribution; to chasten; as, to punish traitors with death; a father punishes his child for willful disobedience. "A greater power Now ruled him, punished in the shape he sinned."

To inflict a penalty for (an offense) upon the offender; to repay, as a fault, crime, etc., with pain or loss; as, to punish murder or treason with death.

To injure, as by beating; to pommel. (Low)

To deal with roughly or harshly; chiefly used with regard to a contest; as, our troops punished the enemy. (Colloq. or Slang)

Synonyms: To chastise; castigate; scourge; whip; lash; correct; discipline. See Chasten.

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Etymology of 'Punish'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Punish" Quotes from Famous Books

... find, but whether they reached him she did not know. For more than two years the silence between them had been that of death, till, indeed, at times she thought that he must be dead. And now he was come back, a commander in the army of Titus, who marched to punish the rebellious Jews. Would she ever see him again? Miriam could not tell. Yet she knelt and prayed from her pure heart that if it were once only, she might speak with him face to face. Indeed, it was this hope of meeting that, more than any other, ...

— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard

... through him that is as pathological as measles. Only we handle it under the heading of criminology. It's like taking an earache to the chiropodist. The boy is a thief. It's through him like a rotten spot, but instead of curing him the law wants to punish him. It's like spanking a child for having the measles. But to get back—Mrs. Blair has him in this play—just as if she had lifted him out of this apartment. She wrote him from the life, too. A young fellow who used to be on her husband's ...

— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst

... Deanery. And thus gradually the Dean became practical ruler of the cathedral—the Bishop had no voice in affairs of the Chapter, except on appeal. And it is a curious fact that the Canons attempted to exclude the Dean from the managing body, as having no Prebend. He could expel from the choir, and punish the contumacious, but they contended that he had no power to touch the revenues. It was because of this that Bishop Sudbury (1370), in order to prevent the scandal of the Dean being excluded when ...

— Old St. Paul's Cathedral • William Benham

... still she lives. When she comes to a house they call her Heide (the bright, the welcome), and regard her as a propitious vala or prophetess. She can tame wolves, understands witchcraft, and delights wicked women. Hereupon the gods consulted together whether they should punish this misdeed, or accept a blood-fine, when Odin cast forth a spear among mankind, and now began war and slaughter in the world. The defenses of the burgh of the asas was broken down. The vans anticipated war, and hastened ...

— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre

... a disorderly and disreputable character, which, in fact, her dressing as a man clearly shows, but I know of no law to punish ...

— Sinks of London Laid Open • Unknown

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