decry means to denounce as harmful. It carries an Arena rating of 1630, earned across 15 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, decry ranks #960 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #1,792 of 17,134 for Most Malleable Words, #2,434 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #3,422 of 17,132 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound.
decry is pronounced /dɪˈkɹaɪ/.
Why “decry” is a great word
To publicly denounce or condemn something as harmful or wrong. From Middle French *decrier* (“to denigrate, depreciate”), from Old French *descrier* (“to shout, cry out”), with the pejorative sense of *de-* (“down”) emerging by the 13th century in French and first attested in English c. 1600. Unlike “descry” (to catch sight of something distant) or “depreciate” (to lessen in value), to decry is a public act of moral accusation. It is the editorial thundering from a broadsheet page, the impassioned voice rising in the crowded square, and the sharp rebuke that seeks not merely to observe but to shame—a verbal act of protest against a world perceived as sliding into error, where condemnation often outlasts the thing condemned.
Etymology
C. 1600, from Middle French decrier (“to denigrate; depreciate”), from Old French descrier (“to shout”) (modern décrier). Doublet of descry. The pejorative meaning had not been present in the Middle English loan, but it was present in the French word from at least the 13th century, with a meaning of "to denigrate; depreciate; to announce the depreciation or suppression of a currency", presumably from the interpretation of de- as meaning "down, inferior".
verb
- To denounce as harmful.
- To blame for ills.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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