Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use libel in a sentence

20 example sentences · noun, verb

Libel means a written or pictorial false statement which unjustly seeks to damage someone's reputation. Example: “He libelled her when he published that.”

Examples of libel by meaning

verbTo defame (someone), especially in a manner that meets the legal definition of libel.

  • He libelled her when he published that.

More sentences with libel

  • The newspaper was forced to recaption the photograph to avoid a libel suit.From the entry recaption
  • If you publish that article, you are accusable of libel.From the entry accusable
  • He may be insulting, a miserable rotter and a fool, but unless he slanders or libels you, or damages your property, you do not have standing to sue him.From the entry standing
  • The “Wagatha Christie” libel battle kept headline writers and lovers of soap opera happy for months.2022, Kate Moore, Here We Go Again...: Unpublished Letters to the Daily Telegraph (page vii). From the entry Wagatha Christie
  • Libel chill, without a shred of doubt, for all the channels went silent.2014 May 29, Saurav Datta, “Hush — slander is a criminal offence in India”, in Index on Censorship, UK, retrieved 29 May 2014. From the entry libel chill
  • The most notorious Twitter libel case, sometimes called Twibel cases, involved rocker Courtney Love.2013, Robert Trager, Joseph Russomanno, Susan Dente Ross, The Law of Journalism and Mass Communication, page 154. From the entry twibel
  • It's the kind of blood libel that in another era was spread about Jews.2006 October 15, Frank Rich, “The Gay Old Party Comes Out”, in The New York Times. From the entry blood libel
  • His unsparing terminology would keep an innful of libel lawyers in funds today.2006, Thomas Dormandy, “The age of the cathedrals”, in The Worst of Evils: The Fight Against Pain, New Haven, Conn.; London: Yale…. From the entry innful
  • Even Siklos is forced to refer to the "libel chill" around Black.1996 February 3, Robert Winder, “Black humours”, in The Independent, UK, retrieved 29 May 2014. From the entry libel chill
  • Counsel for the Defence objected to the libel, on the grounds that the offence was innominate.1950 January, David L. Smith, “A Runaway at Beattock”, in Railway Magazine, page 55. From the entry innominate
  • Ballard sue J.G Ballard for, on grounds of malicious libel?2013, John Sutherland, Curiosities of Literature: A Feast for Book Lovers, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., →ISBN. From the entry Sue, Grabbit and Runne
  • I'm not going to name names 'cos I don't want to make libel lawyers Sue, Grabbitt and Run any richer.2009, Jimmy Greaves, Ian St John, Saint And Greavsie's Funny Old Games, Hachette UK, →ISBN. From the entry Sue, Grabbit and Runne
  • What I called blood libel was the charge that Pope Pius XII, and my church, were moral accessories to mass murder.1989 September 12, Patrick J. Buchanan, “‘We Did Not Go to Auschwitz to Be Beaten’; In Defense of Pius XII”, in The New York Times. From the entry blood libel
  • Forrest later attacked Willis in New York, knocking him to the ground; lawsuits proliferated as Willis sued Forrest for assault, and Forrest countersued for libel.2014, Eric L. Haralson, Encyclopedia of American Poetry: The Nineteenth Century, page 497. From the entry Willis
  • “What happens when an editorial assistant on a weekly paper lets the bosses in for substantial libel damages?” He was able to answer that one.1960, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, chapter XIII, in Jeeves in the Offing, London: Herbert Jenkins, →OCLC. From the entry injudicious
  • Rebekah Vardy has been accused of throwing her former agent and friend “under a bus” in a last-ditch attempt to save her reputation in the “Wagatha Christie” libel trial.2022 May 12, Jim Waterson, Jim Waterson, “‘Wagatha Christie’ trial: Rebekah Vardy accused of throwing friend ‘under bus’”, in The…. From the entry throw under a bus
  • The many libel and defamation suits that litter the courts show that the figurative brickbat hurts just as much as, if not more than, the literal one.2020 February 7, Shashi Tharoor, “Shashi Tharoor’s Word of the Week: Brickbat”, in Hindustan Times, New Delhi: HT Media, →ISSN, →OCLC…. From the entry brickbat
  • Lady Wallingford had been circulating defamatory libels against Buckingham, leading James to comment that Wallingford was like his father-in-law, 'altogether guided and overruled by an archwife'.2002, Pauline Croft, King James. From the entry archwife
  • The fantasies of blood libel that Bosnian Serbs retailed about Bosnian Muslims were the fantasies that Rhinelanders had centuries earlier retailed about the Jews they had murdered.1998 February 1, Alan Ryan, “Hot Spots (review of The Warrior's Honor: Ethnic War and the Modern Conscience by Michael Ignatieff)”, in The…. From the entry retail

Meaning of libel

  1. noun A written or pictorial false statement which unjustly seeks to damage someone's reputation.
  2. noun The act or tort of displaying such a statement publicly.
  3. noun Any defamatory writing; a lampoon; a satire.

Full definition of libel

Questions about libel in a sentence

How do you use libel in a sentence?
Libel is used as a noun and verb. For example: “He libelled her when he published that.”
What is a short sentence with libel?
“He libelled her when he published that.”
What does libel mean?
Libel means a written or pictorial false statement which unjustly seeks to damage someone's reputation.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: libel (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use libel in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/libel. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.