debauch

/dɪˈbɔːt͡ʃ/

debauch noun: an individual act of debauchery.

Noun

debauch (plural debauches)

An individual act of debauchery.
- [E]v'ry twentieth pace / Conducts the unguarded noſe to ſuch a whiff / Of ſtale debauch forth-iſſuing from the ſtyes / That law has licenſed, as makes temp'rance reel.1785, William Cowper, “Book IV. The Winter Evening.”, in The Task, a Poem, […], London: […] J[oseph] Johnson; […], →OCLC, page 161
- I rose by candle-light, and consumed, in the intensest application, the hours which every other individual of our party wasted in enervating slumbers, from the hesternal dissipation or debauch.1828, [Edward Bulwer-Lytton], chapter XX, in Pelham; or, The Adventures of a Gentleman. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 196
An orgy.
- The flowers, oppressive to the eyes, blazed with not a petal stirring, in a debauch of sun.1934 October, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Burmese Days, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, →OCLC; republished as chapter 2, in Burmese Days (ebook no. 0200051h.html)...
- [T]here were always the gay and silly sensual young girls that Yossarian had found and brought there and those that the sleepy enlisted men returning to Pianosa after their own exhausting seven-day debauch had brought there.1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, chapter 13, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC

Verb

debauch (third-person singular simple present debauches, present participle debauching, simple past and past participle debauched)

(transitive) To morally corrupt (someone); to seduce.
- But the Devil had met with too much Success in his first Attempts, not to go on with his general Resolution of debauching the Minds of Men, and bringing them off from God.1727, Daniel Defoe, chapter 9, in The History of the Devil
Synonyms:

immoralize, lead astray, sophisticate, adulterate, corrupt, demoralize, detort, file, pervert, pollute
(transitive) To debase (something); to lower the value of (something).
- Those who with nine months toil had spoil’d a Play,
  In hopes of Eating at a full Third day,
  Justly despairing longer to sustain
  A craving Stomach from an empty Brain,
  Have left Stage-Practice, chang’d their old Vocations,
  Atoning for bad Plays, with worse Translations,
  And like old Sternhold with...1685, Matthew Prior, “A Satyr on the modern Translators”, in H. Bunker Wright, Monroe K. Spears, editors, The Literary Works of Matthew Prior, Second edition, volume I, Oxford: Clarendon Press...
- [S]aving of all kinds is pointless when interest is microscopic and state-sponsored inflation is debauching the currency.2014 March 23, Peter Hitchens, “We're being dragged into a new Cold War by a puffed-up bullfrog (and I don't mean President Putin)”, in Peter Hitchens's Blog at The Mail on Sunday (UK)
Synonyms:

abase, degrade, devalue, avile, debase, depreciate, devaluate, dirty, elevate, vitiate
(intransitive) To indulge in revelry.

Synonyms:

carouse, celebrate, party, revel

debauch meaning in Urdu, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada

debauch in Malayalam

വശീകരിക്കുക, ദുഷിപ്പിക്കുക, മലിനമാക്കുക, ആചാരം കെടുത്തുക, കെടുത്തുക

debauch in Kannada

ಹಾದರಮಾಡು, ವ್ಯಭಿಚಾರಮಾಡು, ಪರಸ್ತ್ರೀ ಸಹವಾಸ ಬೆಳೆಸು, ಹೊಲಗೆಡಿಸು, ಮಲಿನಮಾಡು, ಕೊಳಕುಮಾಡು

Examples of debauch in a sentence

As I supported him towards his lodgings I could see that he was not only suffering from the effects of a recent debauch, but that a long course of intemperance had affected his nerves and his brain.1884, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Barrington Cowles:
Greene died of a debauch; and Marlowe, the gracer of tragedians, perished in an ignominious brawl.1902, Thomas Ebenezer Webb, The Mystery of William Shakespeare: A Summary of Evidence, page 242:
[T]he room probably was one which he actually used for opium debauches.1913, Sax Rohmer, chapter 25, in The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu:

Synonyms of debauch

21 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of debauch

Forms of debauch

Noun
plural	debauches
alternative form	debosh
Verb
third-person singular present	debauches
present participle	debauching
past participle	debauched
past	debauched

Origin of debauch

1590s, from Middle French desbaucher (“entice from work or duty”), from Old French desbauchier (“to lead astray”), from des- + bauch (“beam”), from Frankish *balkō, from Proto-Germanic *balkô, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵ- (“beam, plank”); latter origin of balk. Evolution of sense unclear; may be literally “to shave/trim wood to make a beam” or may be “to leave/lure someone from a workshop”, Frankish *balkō perhaps also meaning “workshop”. Possible corruption by way of Anglicised French term bord (“edge, curb”): curb crawling as a synonym for prostitution. Parallels in modern German: Bordsteinschwalbe (“prostitute”, literally “Curb-stone-swallow”). English words bawd, bawdiness may be similarly connected.

Words formed from debauch

Questions about debauch

What does debauch mean?: Debauch means an individual act of debauchery.
What is debauch in Urdu?: Debauch in Urdu is بگاڑنا, للچانا. See Debauch meaning in Urdu.
How do you use debauch in a sentence?: As I supported him towards his lodgings I could see that he was not only suffering from the effects of a recent debauch, but that a long course of intemperance had affected his nerves and his brain.
What part of speech is debauch?: Debauch can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce debauch?: Debauch is pronounced /dɪˈbɔːt͡ʃ/.
What is the plural of debauch?: The plural of debauch is debauches.

Words near debauch in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: debauch (page history and authors); debauch (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Debauch (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); debauch (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); debauch (Kannada Wiktionary) (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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

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

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