regret
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɹɪˈɡɹɛt/
ipa: /ɹəˈɡɹɛt/
ipa: /ɹiˈɡɹɛt/
rhymes: -ɛt
Forms: form: regrets
form: regretting
form: regretted
form: regretted
Etymology: From Middle English regretten, regreten, from Old French regreter, regrater (“to lament”), from re- (intensive prefix) + *greter, *grater (“to weep”), from Frankish *grātan (“to weep, mourn, lament”), from Proto-Germanic *grētaną (“to weep”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰreh₁d- (“to sound”); and Frankish *greutan (“to cry, weep”), from Proto-Germanic *greutaną (“to weep, cry”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰrewd- (“to weep, be sad”), equivalent to re- + greet. Cognate with Old High German grāzan (“to cry”), Old English grǣtan (“to weep, greet”), Old English grēotan (“to weep, lament”), Old Norse gráta (“to weep, groan”), Gothic 𐌲𐍂𐌴𐍄𐌰𐌽 (grētan, “to weep”). More at greet.
Senses: examples: text: He regretted his words.
text: Judge Short had gone to town, and Farrar was off for a three days' cruise up the lake. I was bitterly regretting I had not gone with him when the distant notes of a coach horn reached my ear, and I descried a four-in-hand winding its way up the inn road from the direction of Mohair.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
text: Dear humanity, we regret bein' alien bastards, we regret comin' to Earth, and we most definitely regret the Corps just blew up our raggedy-ass fleet!
ref: 2004 November 9, Bungie, Halo 2, spoken by Avery Johnson (David Scully), Microsoft Game Studios, Xbox, level/area: Outskirts:
synonyms: rue
glosses: To feel sorry about (a thing that has or has not happened), afterthink: to wish that a thing had not happened, that something else had happened instead.
examples: text: I regret that I have to do this, but I don't have a choice.
synonyms: word: grieve
word: lament
word: aggrieve
word: besorrow
word: condole
word: engrieve
word: erme
word: gloom
word: grieve
word: grieven
word: bleed
word: lament
word: moan
word: mourn
word: regret
word: rue
word: sigh
word: sorrow
word: wayment
word: yearn
glosses: To feel sorry about (any thing).
examples: text: He more than ever regretted his home, and with increased desire longed to see his family.
ref: 1845, The Church of England Magazine, volume 19, page 301:
text: This [the Cage] was but one of Cluny’s hiding-places; he had caves, besides, and underground chambers in several parts of his country; and following the reports of his scouts, he moved from one to another as the soldiers drew near or moved away. By this manner of living, and thanks to the affection of his clan, he had not only stayed all this time in safety, while so many others had fled or been taken and slain: but stayed four or five years longer, and only went to France at last by the express command of his master. There he soon died; and it is strange to reflect that he may have regretted his Cage upon Ben Alder.
ref: 1886 May 1 – July 31, Robert Louis Stevenson, Kidnapped, being Memoirs of the Adventures of David Balfour in the Year 1751: […], London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 1886, →OCLC:
glosses: To miss; to feel the loss or absence of; to mourn.
Derived terms: live to regret
regretter