spiteful

C2+ Topic:Describing Qualities

US /ˈspaɪtfəl/ UK /ˈspaɪtfəl/ See IPA manual

Meanings

1

adj
showing or motivated by a desire to hurt or offend

Her spiteful remark was clearly meant to wound him.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 adj · showing or motivated by a... malicious vindictive malevolent venomous catty nasty rancorous

Opposites

kind benevolent charitable gracious

Word family

Forms spitefully

Derived forms spitefullyspitefulness

Related forms spite despite

Etymology

From spite + -ful; spite is a shortening of despite, from Old French despit, from Latin despectus ('a looking down on'), from despicere ('to look down on').

despit Middle English despectus Latin

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Describing Qualities Word Formation & Derivatives

External links

# spiteful

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** adj
**IPA (US):** /ˈspaɪtfəl/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈspaɪtfəl/

## Meanings
1. showing or motivated by a desire to hurt or offend

## Examples
- Her spiteful remark was clearly meant to wound him.

## Synonyms
- malicious
- vindictive
- malevolent
- venomous
- catty
- nasty
- rancorous

## Antonyms
- kind
- benevolent
- charitable
- gracious

## Derived Forms
- spitefully
- spitefulness

## Related Forms
- spite
- despite

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: despit
- Root: despectus

## Etymology
From spite + -ful; spite is a shortening of despite, from Old French despit, from Latin despectus ('a looking down on'), from despicere ('to look down on').

## AI Etymology
Spiteful comes from spite + -ful; spite is a shortening of despite, from Old French despit, from Latin despectus ('a looking down on'), from despicere ('to look down on'). The historical chain includes Old French despit and Latin despectus. Older glosses in the chain include "a looking down on" and "to look down on", which help explain the semantic range of the modern word. Morphologically, spiteful is best read as compound, suffixal formation, and borrowing, yielding an English adjective shaped by both form history and later usage. In current English it functions as an adjective, with the sense "showing or motivated by a desire to hurt or offend". English derivatives include spitefully and spitefulness; related forms include spite and despite. The result is an English adjective whose etymology preserves the older forms while supporting the word's specialized modern meaning.

## Topics
- Describing Qualities
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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