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debauch

noun
/dɪˈbɔːt͡ʃ/

Etymology

1590s, from Middle French desbaucher (“entice from work or duty”), from Old French desbauchier (“to lead astray”), from des- + bauch (“beam”), from Frankish *balkō, from Proto-Germanic *balkô, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵ- (“beam, plank”); latter origin of balk. Evolution of sense unclear; may be literally “to shave/trim wood to make a beam” or may be “to leave/lure someone from a workshop”, Frankish *balkō perhaps also meaning “workshop”. Possible corruption by way of Anglicised French term bord (“edge, curb”): curb crawling as a synonym for prostitution. Parallels in modern German: Bordsteinschwalbe (“prostitute”, literally “Curb-stone-swallow”). English words bawd, bawdiness may be similarly connected.

  1. derived from *bʰelǵ-✻
  2. derived from *balkô✻
  3. derived from *balkō✻
  4. derived from desbauchier
  5. borrowed from desbaucher

Definitions

  1. An individual act of debauchery.

    • [E]v'ry twentieth pace / Conducts the unguarded noſe to ſuch a whiff / Of ſtale debauch forth-iſſuing from the ſtyes / That law has licenſed, as makes temp'rance reel.
    • I rose by candle-light, and consumed, in the intensest application, the hours which every other individual of our party wasted in enervating slumbers, from the hesternal dissipation or debauch.
    • As I supported him towards his lodgings I could see that he was not only suffering from the effects of a recent debauch, but that a long course of intemperance had affected his nerves and his brain.

  2. An orgy.

    • The flowers, oppressive to the eyes, blazed with not a petal stirring, in a debauch of sun.
    • [T]here were always the gay and silly sensual young girls that Yossarian had found and brought there and those that the sleepy enlisted men returning to Pianosa after their own exhausting seven-day debauch had brought there.

  3. To morally corrupt (someone)

    To morally corrupt (someone); to seduce.

    • But the Devil had met with too much Success in his first Attempts, not to go on with his general Resolution of debauching the Minds of Men, and bringing them off from God.
  4. ›+ 2 more definitions

    1. To debase (something)

      To debase (something); to lower the value of (something).

      • [S]aving of all kinds is pointless when interest is microscopic and state-sponsored inflation is debauching the currency.

    2. To indulge in revelry.

The neighborhood

Derived

debauchee, debaucher, debauchery, debauchment, debauchness

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for debauch. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA