Flogged

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Beaten with a whip or stick as a form of punishment ; sold or marketed aggressively, often with excessive enthusiasm
2. Received lashes as a penalty for wrongdoing ; pushed or advertised forcefully to encourage sales or acceptance
3. Punished by being struck repeatedly with a whip or rod ; urged strongly in sales or promotion to persuade buying or interest

Etymology: The sense of "flog" as a sales push is far younger than its meaning of whipping, and the two are not obviously related. The older sense comes from a Germanic root meaning "to beat," reconstructed as Proto-Germanic "flukkōną." Its rhythmic, repeated striking gave English a verb built on a fast, slapping sound, and cognates survive in Scots, where "flog" could mean a blow or a stripe, and in Norwegian "flak," a torn-off strip. The origin of the English verb is uncertain. One view treats it as a Middle English form suggested by "flogge," a word for a hammer or sledge, which would fit the idea of repeated striking. Another treats it as a back-formation from "flogger," a word borrowed from Low German meaning a flail. Both routes lead back to the same idea of beating. The commercial sense is a modern development. It arose from the same notion of relentless, repeated effort: to flog something is to push it hard and keep pushing. The word's most recent twist is a blend of "fake" and "blog," which gives "fake blog," a term for covertly promotional writing.

Synonyms: beaten, whipped, lashed, punished, thrased

Antonyms: freed, released, liberated, spared, saved