countermanded
countermanded is the simple past and past participle of countermand.
Meaning of countermand
Verb
countermand (third-person singular simple present countermands, present participle countermanding, simple past and past participle countermanded)
- To revoke (a former command); to cancel or rescind by giving an order contrary to one previously given.
- Near-synonym: counteract
- Synonyms:
- cancel, rescind, veto, override, counteract
- To recall a person or unit with such an order.
- To cancel an order for (some specified goods).
- Three of the maids of honour ſent to countermand their birth-day cloaths; two of them burnt all their collections of novels and romances, and ſent to a bookſeller’s in Pall-mall to buy each of them a bible, and Taylor’s holy living and dying.1727, Jonathan Swift, A True and Faithful Narrative of What Passed in London
- To counteract, to act against, to frustrate.
- Early on, Ezra gives her a lesson to countermand the endless female impulse to apologise: “Darling, don’t continually say ‘I’m sorry’. Next time you feel like saying ‘I’m sorry’, instead say ‘Fuck you’.”2018 February 28, Justine Jordan, “Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday review – a dizzying debut”, in The Guardian
- To prohibit (a course of action or behavior).
- Avicen countermands letting blood in choleric bodles.1672, Gideon Harvey, Morbus Anglicus, Or, The Anatomy of Consumptions
- To oppose or revoke the command of (someone).
- For us to alter anything, is to lift ourselves against God; and, as it were, to countermand him.[1594], Richard Hooker, edited by J[ohn] S[penser], Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie, […], London: […] Iohn Windet, […], →OCLC, (please specify the page)
Words formed from countermanded
Questions about countermanded
- What is countermanded the simple past and past participle of?
- Countermanded is the simple past and past participle of countermand.
Words near countermanded in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: countermanded (page history and authors); countermand (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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Cite this entry: “countermanded.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/countermanded. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
