defamatory

Etymology

It is partly borrowed from Middle French diffamatoire, recorded in French from about 1380,^[2] and partly borrowed from Medieval Latin diffāmātōrius (“tending to defame”),^[2][3][4][5] which was used in British sources from the 14th century.^[2] The Medieval Latin adjective is formed from the past participle stem of Latin diffāmō (“to spread abroad by ill report”),^[2][3][5] the source of defame, from dis- and fāma (“report, rumour”),^[3] which Etymonline traces to Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to speak, tell, say”).^[3] The English spelling was first diffamatory;^[6] Merriam-Webster Unabridged explains the change of the first syllable as an influence of the verb.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of speech or writing, attacking or denigrating someone, libellous or slanderous: about 1485, in G. Hay's Buke of the Law of Armys, a text dated to 1456.^[2] The 1989 edition of the OED had dated the word to 1592, and Etymonline and Dictionary.com date it to the 1590s; the revised OED found the earlier record.^[7][3][8]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its first meaning, "injurious to a person's reputation".^[2][6] From 1592 it was construed with of or to, naming the person or body defamed,^[2] and since 1648 it was also used of people given to defaming others.^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as "calumnious; tending to defame; unjustly censorious; libellous; falsely satirical".^[9] Etymonline notes that defamative, in the same sense, is recorded earlier, from about 1500.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 1485 – of speech or writing, defaming someone, libellous or slanderous.^[2]
• 1592 – with of or to, naming the person defamed.^[2]
• 1648 – of a person, given to defaming others.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Damaging to someone's good name or reputation; libellous or slanderous: The council sued the newspaper over a defamatory editorial.^[10][6][2]
2. Of a person, given to defaming others.^[2][4]

Word family

• nondefamatory

Related words

• defamation
• defame
• fame
• infamous

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
10. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins