Vituper

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To criticize someone harshly and angrily with insulting or abusive language
2. To revile or berate a person with bitter, scornful words of blame
3. Speaking to someone in a severely censorious and abusive way, heaping scorn upon them

Etymology: Latin speakers used "vituperare" to mean "to find fault with" or "to blame," and the verb's core sense is still censure. Its first half is "vitium," meaning "fault" or "blemish," the same root that gives English "vice" and "vitiate." The second half is probably "parare," "to prepare" or "to make," so the literal sense was something like "to make a fault of someone," or to heap faults upon them. Scholars are less certain about that second element than about the first, but the idea of fault-making fits the verb's use in Roman speech and writing. English took the root and built on it. "Vituperate" was formed from the Latin verb, and "vituper" is a shorter, rarer English form that clips the verbal ending, so it means the same thing with less polish. Its nouns, "vituperation" and "vituperator," follow the same pattern. Most readers will meet these forms in formal or literary writing, where a sharper word than "criticize" is wanted.