palliate

From Latin palliatus (“cloaked”) (in Late Latin the past participle of palliare (“to cover with a cloak”)), from pallium (“cloak”).

• (verb) IPA^(key): /ˈpælieɪt/

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  • Rhymes: -ælieɪt
• (adjective) IPA^(key): /ˈpæliət/

palliate (third-person singular simple present palliates, present participle palliating, simple past and past participle palliated)

1. To relieve the symptoms of; to ameliorate. [from 15th c.]
   • 2009, Boris Johnson, The Evening Standard, 15 Jan 09:

     And if there are some bankers out there who are still embarrassed by the size of their bonuses, then I propose that they palliate their guilt by giving to the Mayor's Fund for London to help deprived children in London.

2. (obsolete) To hide or disguise. [16th–19th c.]
3. To cover or disguise the seriousness of (a mistake, offence etc.) by excuses and apologies. [from 17th c.]
   • April 5 1628, Bishop Joseph Hall, The Blessings, Sins, and Judgments of God's Vineyard

     We extenuate not our guilt : whatever we sin , we condemn it as mortal : they palliate wickedness , with the fair pretence of veniality

4. (obsolete) To lessen the severity of; to extenuate, moderate, qualify. [17th–18th c.]
   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXXVI, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 300:

     "Ah, dearest!" replied he, "your spirits are exhausted,—perhaps unconsciously oppressed with the idea of that future whose pain and whose peril I have rather heightened than palliated."

   • 1924, Herman Melville, chapter 18, in Billy Budd‎, London: Constable & Co.:

     If, mindless of palliating circumstances, we are bound to regard the death of the Master-at-arms as the prisoner's deed, then does that deed constitute a capital crime whereof the penalty is a mortal one?

5. To placate or mollify. [from 17th c.]
   • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 65:

     Bradly stopped dead, too confounded to be appalled. Young Podson! Impossible! He had last seen young Podson, a bank clerk, on the seat of a pub verandah in an inland town ninety miles away, Bradly's last painting town. A noosance, young Podson, only to be palliated on a pub verandah after dinner.

   • 2007 January 25, “Looking towards a Brown future”, in The Guardian:

     Brown's options for the machinery of Whitehall are constrained, as for all prime ministers, by the need to palliate allies and hug enemies close (John Reid, say).

• palliation
• palliative
• pallium

palliate (comparative more palliate, superlative most palliate)

1. (obsolete) Cloaked; hidden, concealed. [15th–17th c.]
2. (obsolete) Eased; mitigated; alleviated.
   • 1661, John Fell, The life of the most learned, reverend, and pious Dr. H. Hammond:

     [the] most helpful method of its Cure, which yet if palliate and imperfect would onely make way to more fatal Sickness

• Paternoster, Lewis M. and Frager-Stone, Ruth. Three Dimensions of Vocabulary Growth. Second Edition. Amsco School Publications: USA. 1998.

• IPA^(key): /palˈlja.te/
• Rhymes: -ate
• Hyphenation: pal‧lià‧te

palliate

1. feminine plural of palliato

palliate

1. feminine plural of palliato

palliate f

1. plural of palliata

palliāte

1. vocative masculine singular of palliātus

• palliate in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)