deflower means to take the virginity of (somebody), especially a woman or girl. It carries an Arena rating of 1359, earned across 73 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, deflower ranks #433 of 17,132 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound, #454 of 17,131 for Scariest Words, #2,961 of 17,143 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words, #3,145 of 17,127 for Most Vivid Words.
deflower is pronounced /diˈflaʊ.ɚ/.
Why “deflower” is a great word
DEFLOWER — [Verb] To take the virginity of (a person, especially a woman or girl), or, literally, to strip of flowers. From Middle English deflouren, from Old French desflorer, from Late Latin dēflōrāre ("to pluck off flowers, to deflower"), from Latin de- ("off") + flōs, flōr- ("flower"). Unlike "ravish," which implies violent seizure, or "consummate," which formalizes a union, "deflower" is a deliberate plucking, a strangely pastoral theft. It is the torn petal ground into the soil, the snapped stem with its cool sap beading, and the specific silence of a vase where a bloom once stood—a word that dresses ruin in the borrowed gentility of a metaphor, because the plain truth is often too sharp to hold.
Etymology
From Middle English deflouren, from Old French desflorer (modern French déflorer), from Late Latin deflōrāre. By surface analysis, de- + flower.
verb
- To take the virginity of (somebody), especially a woman or girl.e.g.“But when you deflower a girl, that's it. You did it. You were the one. No one else can ever do it.” — 1995, Harmony Korine, Kids, spoken by Telly:
- To deprive of flowers.
- To deprive of grace and beauty.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Words closest in meaning
By meaning, not spelling — each word's AI semantic fingerprint, nearest first.