Word.ws English Dictionary

trepidate

trepidate verb: to cause to experience trepidation.

Verb

trepidate (third-person singular simple present trepidates, present participle trepidating, simple past and past participle trepidated)

  1. (transitive, uncommon) To cause to experience trepidation.
    • […] “A little trepidated, if not consternated, they lifted him from his close confinement and put him to bed.”1878, a Memphis newspaper, quoted in 2015, John H. Ellis, Yellow Fever and Public Health in the New South, University Press of Kentucky, page 51
    • If so, he was now deeply trepidated. He had almost hoped she would not live up to expectations. She might have lost her looks, acquired irritating habits, even proved to be unpleasant. But here she was, still beautiful and charming.2016, Debby Holt, The Soulmate, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN
  2. (intransitive, uncommon) To experience trepidation.
    • It sounded rather appalling to be engaged in a glee for three voices, with two performers such as these; and I trepidated a little as I went up stairs, having previously understood that the great man was already come.1876, Thomas De Quincey, The Autobiography of an English Opium-Eater, page 40
    • I trepidated that evening upon entering their apartment; his wife, we were told, was from that other world, and no one briefed us as to how she would show.2007, Jack Womack, Elvissey: A Novel, Grove/Atlantic, Inc., →ISBN

Forms of trepidate

third-person singular presenttrepidates
present participletrepidating
past participletrepidated
pasttrepidated

Origin of trepidate

Either back-formed from, or otherwise related to, trepidation.

Words formed from trepidate

Questions about trepidate

What does trepidate mean?
Trepidate means to cause to experience trepidation.
What part of speech is trepidate?
Trepidate is a verb.
What is the past tense of trepidate?
The past tense of trepidate is trepidated.

Words near trepidate in the dictionary

  1. trepibutone
  2. trepid
  3. trepidacious
  4. trepidancy
  5. trepidant
  6. trepidate
  7. trepidated
  8. trepidates
  9. trepidating
  10. trepidation
  11. trepidations

Source and license

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