Word.ws English Dictionary

bate

/beɪt/

bate verb: to reduce the force of something; to abate. Also the simple past of beat.

Verb (1)

bate (third-person singular simple present bates, present participle bating, simple past and past participle bated)

  1. (transitive) To reduce the force of something; to abate.
    • Ah, left ſome Thorn ſhoul'd pierce thy tender Foot, / Or thou ſhoul'dſt fall in flying my purſuit! / To ſharp uneven Ways thy ſteps decline; / Abate thy Speed, and I will bate of mine.1717, John Dryden, “Book I. [The Transformation of Daphne into a Laurel.]”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 23
  2. (transitive) To restrain, usually with the sense of being in anticipation
    • […] and to his dying day he bated his breath a little when he told the story of the stroke with the willow wand.1859, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], “Home and Its Sorrows”, in Adam Bede […], volume I, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book first, page 66
  3. (figuratively, sometimes, transitive) To cut off, remove, take away.
    • Also about Autumne bate the earth from about the roots of Olives, and lay them bare, but in stead thereof put good mucke thereto.1601, C[aius] Plinius Secundus [i.e., Pliny the Elder], “[Book XVII.] CHAP. XVIII. The manner of planting, ordering, and dressing Olive trees. Also which be the conuenient times for graffing.”, in...
    • Nay, if he be of a proud humour, […] he will not Bate an Ace of abſolute certainty, but however doubtful or improbable the thing is, coming f[r]om him it muſt go for an indiſputable truth.1674, [Richard Allestree], “Of Positiveness”, in The Government of the Tongue. […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: At the Theater, →OCLC, page 197
  4. (archaic, transitive) To leave out, except, bar.
    • Bate the King, and be he fleſh and blood, / He lyes that ſaies it, thy mother at fifteen / Was black and ſinful to her.c. 1608–1611, Francis Beaumont, John Fletcher, “The Maid’s Tragedy”, in Fifty Comedies and Tragedies. […], [part 1], London: […] J[ohn] Macock [and H. Hills], for John Martyn, Henry Herringman, and...
    • Bate (I beſeech you) widdow Dido.1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published...
  5. To waste away.
    • Bardoll, am I not falne away vilely ſince this laſt action? do I not bate? do I not dwindle? Why, my skinne hangs about me like an old Ladies looſe gowne.c. 1597 (date written), [William Shakespeare], The History of Henrie the Fourth; […], quarto edition, London: […] P[eter] S[hort] for Andrew Wise, […], published 1598, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iii]
  6. To deprive of.
    • When baseness is exalted, do not bate / The place its honour for the person's sake; […]a. 1634 (date written), George Herbert, “The Church Porch”, in Alexander B[alloch] Grosart, editor, The Complete Works in Verse and Prose of George Herbert. […] (The Fuller Worthies’ Library), volume...
  7. To lessen by retrenching, deducting, or reducing; to abate; to beat down; to lower.
    • [W]hen the Landholder's Rent falls, he muſt either bate the Labourer's Wages, or not imploy, or not pay him; which either way makes him feel the want of Money.1691, [John Locke], Some Considerations of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, and Raising the Value of Money. […], London: […] Awnsham and John Churchill, […], published 1692, →OCLC, page...
    • The shopkeeper is very good-natured; he will show you everything he has, and does not seem to mind if you buy nothing. He bates a little, but not so much as the Klings, who almost always ask twice what they are willing to take.1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 33
  8. To allow by way of abatement or deduction.
    • Theſe are the conditions of his treating with God, to whom he bates nothing or what he ſtood upon with the Parlament: as if Commiſſions of Array could deale with him alſo.1649, J[ohn] Milton, “Vpon His Penitentiall Meditations and Vowes at ’’Holmby’’”, in ΕΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΆΣΤΗΣ [Eikonoklástēs] […], London: […] Matthew Simmons, […], →OCLC, pages 202–203

Noun (1)

bate (uncountable)

  1. Strife; contention.
    • […] and weares his Boot very ſmooth, like vnto the Signe of the Legge; and breedes no bate with telling of diſcreete stories:c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]. Epilogue.”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […]...
    • So the strife redoubled and the weapons together clashed and ceased not bate and debate and naught was to be seen but blood flowing and necks bowing; […]1885–1888, Richard F[rancis] Burton, transl. and editor, A Plain and Literal Translation of the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments, now Entituled The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night […], Shammar...

Verb (2)

bate (third-person singular simple present bates, present participle bating, simple past and past participle bated)

  1. (intransitive) To contend or strive with blows or arguments.
  2. (intransitive) Of a falcon: to flap the wings vigorously; to bait.
    • The fiꝛſt is holde faſt at all timys, and ſpecially whan ſhe batith. It is calde batyng, for ſhe batith with hiꝛ ſelfe moſt oftyn cauſeles[.]1486, Juliana Berners, Book of Saint Albans
    • I am like a hawk , that bates , when I see occasion of service , but cannot fly because I am tied to another's fist1600, Francis Bacon, letter to Queen Elizabeth, upon the sending of a new-year's gift

Noun (2)

bate (plural bates)

  1. An alkaline lye which neutralizes the effect of the previous application of lime, and makes hides supple in the process of tanning.
    • The process of unliming hides and skins in tanning has been a slow and disgusting one, consisting in soaking the skins in a bath of manure in water, called bate.1888, Popular Science, volume 34, number 10, page 287
  2. A vat which contains this liquid.

Verb (3)

bate (third-person singular simple present bates, present participle bating, simple past and past participle bated)

  1. (transitive) To soak leather so as to remove chemicals used in tanning; to steep in bate.

Noun (3)

bate (uncountable)

  1. (Ireland) direction, course, track
    • What bate are you on now = where are you going and why ? The dog is on some bate = is finding or following a scent.A NORTH-COUNTY DUBLIN CLOSSARY

Proper noun capitalized: Bate

Bate (countable and uncountable, plural Bates)

  1. A surname transferred from the given name.
  2. (obsolete) A diminutive of the male given name Bartholomew.
  3. A town in Comoé province, Burkina Faso.
  4. A village in Nova Gorica municipality, Slovenia.

Also used as

bate is also the simple past of beat.

bate is also the clipping of masturbate.

Forms of bate

Verb
third-person singular presentbates
present participlebating
past participlebated
pastbated
Noun
pluralbates
Proper noun
pluralBates

Past tense of bate: bated

Plural of bate: bates

Origin of bate

Inherited from Middle English baten (“to abate”), an apheretic form of abaten, from Old French abatre (“to knock down”).

* Noun: From the verb, or directly from the noun debate. * Verb: From Middle English bate (“contention”), from Old French batre (French battre), from Latin battere.

Borrowed from Swedish beta (“maceration, tanning”).

Words formed from bate

Words that rhyme with bate

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about bate

What does bate mean?
Bate means to reduce the force of something; to abate.
What part of speech is bate?
Bate can be a verb, a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce bate?
Bate is pronounced /beɪt/.
What is the past tense of bate?
The past tense of bate is bated.

Words near bate in the dictionary

  1. batcrap
  2. Batcul
  3. batdom
  4. Batdorf
  5. Batdorfs
  6. bate
  7. bate an ace
  8. Batea
  9. bateau
  10. Bateau Bay
  11. bateau neck

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bate (page history and authors); Bate (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-bate.ogg.

Cite this entry: “bate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.