Word.ws English Dictionary

did one's duty

did one's duty is the simple past of do one's duty.

Meaning of do one's duty

Verb

do one's duty (third-person singular simple present does one's duty, present participle doing one's duty, simple past did one's duty, past participle done one's duty)

  1. (euphemistic) Synonym of use the toilet: to urinate or defecate.
    • And when I was being toilet-trained as a very little boy, she'd always ask, "Have you done your duty?" That was the word for it.1996, Derrick Humphreys, John A. Munro, The making of a grey panther: the Derrick Humphreys story, page 8
    Synonyms:
    use the toilet
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see do, duty.
    Synonyms:
    use the toilet

Questions about did one's duty

What is did one's duty the simple past of?
Did one's duty is the simple past of do one's duty.

Words near did one's duty in the dictionary

  1. did off
  2. did one's bit
  3. did one's business
  4. did one's damnedest
  5. did one's darnedest
  6. did one's duty
  7. did one's ease
  8. did one's easement
  9. did one's homework
  10. did one's job
  11. did one's own thing

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: did one's duty (page history and authors); do one's duty (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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