exculpatory
Syllables: ex·cul·pat·o·ry/ɪksˈkʌl.pə.tɹi/US/ɛksˈkʌl.pəˌtɔ.ɹi/
exculpatory adjective: tending to excuse or clear of wrongdoing.
Adjective
exculpatory (comparative more exculpatory, superlative most exculpatory)
- Tending to excuse or clear of wrongdoing.
- [I]t remains only to examine the Relevancy of the two general exculpatory Defences pled for the Pannells.1737, “Information for His Majesty’s Advocate, and Mr. Hugh Forbes, Advocate, Procurator Fiscal of the High Court of Admiralty, against Thomas McAdam, and James Long, Pannels”, in Extract of the...
- In the case of the King against Owen, the judge allowed the defendant to produce exculpatory evidence to the jury. In order to shew, that he had no malicious or traitorous intention in publishing the libel, with which he was charged, the court permitted him to plead, that during the rebellion, he...1770 December 6, [John] Dunning, “Debate in the Commons on Serjeant [John] Glynn’s Motion for a Committee to Enquire into the Administration of Criminal Justice, and the Proceedings of the Judges in...
- Synonyms:
- disculpatory, exonerative, vindicatory, absolving, absolutionary, absolutory
- Antonyms:
- criminative, criminatory, incriminating, incriminatory, inculpatory, nonexculpatory, damning
Examples of exculpatory in a sentence
- In the case of the King against Owen, the judge allowed the defendant to produce exculpatory evidence to the jury.1770 December 6, [John] Dunning, “Debate in the Commons on Serjeant [John] Glynn’s Motion for a Committee to Enquire into the...
- He [Alexander Pope] wrote an exculpatory letter to the Duke [James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos], who accepted of his excuſe, without believing his profeſſions.1794, “The Life of Pope”, in The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, Esq. […], Edinburgh: Printed by Mundell and Son, […], →OCLC; republished...
- This apology, I am not unaware, has been advanced by some of our heroine's friends, and been admitted as exculpatory by others.1803, [Charles Aldis], “Letter V”, in A Defence of the Character and Conduct of the Late Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, Founded on Principles...
- The goal of the investigation is to excavate and present evidence, incriminatory or exculpatory, directly relevant to the complaint issued when the case was first handed over.2013 August, Michael W. Graves, “Case Management and Report Writing”, in Bernard Goodwin, editor, Digital Archaeology: The Art and Science...
Synonyms of exculpatory
Antonyms
Forms of exculpatory
| comparative | more exculpatory |
|---|---|
| superlative | most exculpatory |
Origin of exculpatory
From exculpate + -ory (suffix forming adjectives with the sense ‘of or pertaining to, serving for’). Exculpate is derived from Medieval Latin exculpātus, perfect passive participle of exculpō (“to free from blame, exculpate”), from ex- (prefix meaning ‘out, away’) + culpa (“defect, fault; crime”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kʷelp-). Cognate with Spanish exculpatorio.
Words formed from exculpatory
Questions about exculpatory
- What does exculpatory mean?
- Exculpatory means tending to excuse or clear of wrongdoing.
- How do you use exculpatory in a sentence?
- In the case of the King against Owen, the judge allowed the defendant to produce exculpatory evidence to the jury.
- What part of speech is exculpatory?
- Exculpatory is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce exculpatory?
- Exculpatory is pronounced /ɪksˈkʌl.pə.tɹi/ (UK).
Words near exculpatory in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: exculpatory (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-uk-exculpatory.oga.
Cite this entry: “exculpatory.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/exculpatory. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.