My Word of The Day, Aggravate

Aggravate

/ˈæg.rə.veɪt/ *verb [T]

What does it mean?

• MAKE WORSE
  -to make a bad situation worse
  -to make a disease worse
• ANNOY
  -informal: to annoy someone
  =Stop aggravating me, will you!

Example:

Putin added that the situation was aggravated by the fact that some important regions would not be able to start the winter-sowing campaign.The weather outlook is little changed for this week, with a slight drop in temperatures forecast for later in the week. Quoted from:Reuters

Etymology:

1520s, from pp. adj. aggravate (late 15c.), from L. aggravatus , pp. of aggravare "to render troublesome, to make heavy". Earlier in this sense was aggrave . To aggravate has properly only one meaning -- to make (an evil) worse or more serious. [Fowler]Phrase aggravating circumstances is recorded from 1790.

Synonyms:

• add insult to injury, exacerbate, exaggerate, fan the flames of, heighten, increase, inflame, intensify, magnify, make worse, worsen, annoy

Antonyms:

• alleviate, assuage, calm, diminish, ease, improve, lessen, mitigate, smooth, assuage, calm, pacify, please

Posted in: English, MWOTD, Vocabulary