irritate
verbverbattested in dialogue
- //ˈɪɹ.ɪˌteɪt//
To provoke impatience, anger, or displeasure in.
verb
- 1
To provoke impatience, anger, or displeasure in.
If thou irritatest my lord, there will come to war against thee all the Getulians, Numidians, and Garamantes, Afric contains.
Thou scandalizest me and irritatest my nature as much as it possibly can be irritated.
Thanks to that penny he had just spent so recklessly [on a newspaper] he would pass a happy hour, taken, for once, out of his anxious, despondent, miserable self. It irritated him shrewdly to know that these moments of respite from carking care would not be shared with his poor wife, with careworn, troubled Ellen.
- 2
To cause or induce displeasure or irritation.
- 3
To induce pain in (all or part of a body or organism).
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin irrītātus, perfect passive participle of irrītō (“excite, irritate, incite, stimulate”), see -ate (verb-forming suffix).
verb
- 1
obsoleteTo render null and void.
c. 1634-1661 John Bramhall, Protestants' Ordination Defended Are human laws presently superfluous, so often as they do not irritate or abrogate Divine laws ?
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin irritātus, perfect passive participle of irritō (“to invalidate, render void, annul”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from irritus (“invalid”), the equivalent of in- + ratus (“valid, established, fixed”).
Forms
- past tense
- irritated
- past participle
- irritated
- present participle
- irritating
- third person singular
- irritates
irritate · To provoke impatience, anger, or displeasure in.
irritated · Experiencing a feeling of irritation.irritating · Causing irritation, annoyance or pain.Irving · A surname from Scottish Gaelic.