Word.ws English Dictionary

punished

Syllables: pun·ished/ˈpʌnɪʃt/

punished is the simple past and past participle of punish.

Meaning of punish

Verb

punish (third-person singular simple present punishes, present participle punishing, simple past and past participle punished)

  1. (transitive) To cause (a child, student, or someone else being looked after, or a suspect or criminal) to suffer for crime or misconduct, to administer disciplinary action, typically by an authority or a person in authority (for example: a parent, teacher, or police officer).
    • If a prince violates the law, then he must be punished like an ordinary person.
  2. (figuratively, transitive) To treat harshly and unfairly.
    • But each effort that Anna makes —and she has attempted many— meets with obstacles from a welfare bureaucracy that punishes single mothers for initiative and partial economic self-sufficiency.1994, Valerie Polakow, Lives on the Edge: Single Mothers and Their Children in the Other America, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 68
    Synonyms:
    mistreat
  3. (colloquial, transitive) To handle or beat severely; to maul.
  4. (colloquial, transitive) To consume a large quantity of.
    • A few moments later, we were all sitting around the veranda of the hunters' dining hall, punishing the gin, as usual.1970, Doc Greene, The Memory Collector, page 49

Adjective

punished (comparative more punished, superlative most punished)

  1. That has been the object of punishment.
    Synonyms:
    chastised, done

Synonyms of punished

Antonyms

Forms of punished

comparativemore punished
superlativemost punished

Words formed from punished

Questions about punished

What does punished mean?
Punished means that has been the object of punishment.
What is punished the simple past and past participle of?
Punished is the simple past and past participle of punish.
What part of speech is punished?
Punished is an adjective.
How do you pronounce punished?
Punished is pronounced /ˈpʌnɪʃt/.

Words near punished in the dictionary

  1. punishability
  2. punishable
  3. punishableness
  4. punishably
  5. punishe
  6. punished
  7. punishee
  8. punishees
  9. punishement
  10. punisher
  11. punishers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: punished (page history and authors); punish (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: “punished.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/punished. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.