Word.ws English Dictionary

tyrannise

tyrannise is the non-Oxford British English standard spelling of tyrannize.

Meaning of tyrannize

Verb

tyrannize (third-person singular simple present tyrannizes, present participle tyrannizing, simple past and past participle tyrannized)

  1. (transitive) To oppress (someone).
    • In truth he was the type of man who is spoilt by the submission of weaker people than himself. There are such men, who must either be tyrannized or be tyrants […]1929, Edgar Wallace, “The Tyrant of the House”, in The Iron Grip, London: George Newnes
    Synonyms:
    domineer
  2. (intransitive) To rule as a tyrant.
    • The prince tyrannized over his subjects.
    Synonyms:
    domineer

Forms of tyrannise

third-person singular presenttyrannises
present participletyrannising
past participletyrannised
pasttyrannised

Origin of tyrannise

From Middle French tyranniser, equivalent to tyranny + -ise.

Questions about tyrannise

What is tyrannise the non-Oxford British English standard spelling of?
Tyrannise is the non-Oxford British English standard spelling of tyrannize.

Words near tyrannise in the dictionary

  1. tyrannies
  2. tyrannies of majorities
  3. tyrannies of the majority
  4. tyrannies of the masses
  5. tyranning
  6. tyrannise
  7. tyrannised
  8. tyranniser
  9. tyrannisers
  10. tyrannises
  11. tyrannish

Source and license

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