defend

CEFRB1

/dɪˈfɛnd/

verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    verb

    To protect someone or something from attack or criticism.

  2. 02

    verb

    Extra detail

    To make legal defence of; to represent (the accused).

Examples

  • The role of the military is to defend the country.

  • We have to defend our country from the foreign aggression.

At a glance

Sits at B1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Deep Dive

verb

Extra meanings

  1. To support by words or writing; to vindicate, talk in favour of.

  2. To ward off attacks against; to fight to protect; to guard.

  3. To focus one's energies and talents on preventing opponents from scoring, as opposed to focusing on scoring.

More examples

In context

  • We must defend our freedom at all cost.

  • The teams strategy was to defend but score runs as well for the first 20 overs.

  • Justice Elena Kagan on Thursday defended the code of conduct the Supreme Court created last year, but conceded there needs to be a way to enforce the rules for it to be more effective.

Synonyms

Antonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The lawyer will vigorously blank her client against the accusations of fraud.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

verb

From Middle English defenden, from Old French defendre, deffendre (Modern French défendre), from Latin dēfendō (“to ward off”), from Proto-Italic *fendō, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰen-. Displaced native Old English bewerian.