Word.ws English Dictionary

maculate

/ˈmækjʊleɪt/

maculate verb: to spot; to stain; to blur. Also the past participle of maculate.

Verb

maculate (third-person singular simple present maculates, present participle maculating, simple past and past participle maculated)

  1. To spot; to stain; to blur.
    • they wolde nat maculate the honour of their people with suche a reproche1531, Thomas Elyot, The Boke Named the Governour […], London: […] Tho[mas] Bertheleti, →OCLC
    • There was a fresh smell in the air. Sidewalks began to be maculated with spreading areas of dryness1918, Louis Joseph Vance, “Chapter 21”, in The False Faces

Adjective

maculate (comparative more maculate, superlative most maculate)

  1. (archaic, poetic) Marked with spots or maculae; blotched.
  2. (archaic, poetic) Defiled, impure.
    • [Les Misérables is] about the struggle of a mistreated man as he rises to the top, along with a mortal conflict between this maculate virtuous man and an immaculate pursuing demon.1998 May 25, The New Republic

Also used as

maculate is also the past participle of maculate.

Forms of maculate

Verb
third-person singular presentmaculates
present participlemaculating
past participlemaculated
pastmaculated
Adjective
comparativemore maculate
superlativemost maculate

Origin of maculate

First attested during the last quarter of the 15th century, in Middle English; inherited from Middle English maculaten (“to spoil, polute”), borrowed from Latin maculātus, perfect passive participle of maculō (“to spot”), see -ate (verb-forming suffix) and -ate (adjective-forming suffix).

Words formed from maculate

Questions about maculate

What does maculate mean?
Maculate means to spot; to stain; to blur.
What part of speech is maculate?
Maculate can be a verb or an adjective.
How do you pronounce maculate?
Maculate is pronounced /ˈmækjʊleɪt/.
What is the past tense of maculate?
The past tense of maculate is maculated.

Words near maculate in the dictionary

  1. maculae
  2. maculae luteae
  3. macular
  4. macular degeneration
  5. maculas
  6. maculate
  7. maculated
  8. maculated fever
  9. maculates
  10. maculating
  11. maculation

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: maculate (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: “maculate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/maculate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.