demerit

From Old French desmerite (modern French démérite).

• IPA^(key): /dɪˈmɛɹɪt/

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• Rhymes: -ɛɹɪt

demerit (countable and uncountable, plural demerits)

1. A quality of being inadequate; a fault; a disadvantage
   • 1672, William Temple, “An Essay upon the Original and Nature of Government. […]”, in Miscellanea. The First Part. [...], 3rd edition, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], and Awnsham and John Churchill, […], published 1691, OCLC 1113628240, page 70:

     [W]hatever they acquire by their Induſtry or Ingenuity […] ſhould be as much their Property, as any diviſions of Land or of Stock that are made to the Sons; and the Poſſeſſion as ſecure, unleſs forfeited by any demerit or offence againſt the cuſtoms of the Family, which grow with time to be the Orders of this little State.

   • 1790 November, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, and on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event. […], London: […] J[ames] Dodsley, […], OCLC 946162345:

     They see no merit or demerit in any man or any action.

2. A mark given for bad conduct to a person attending an educational institution or serving in the army.
   • 2002, George W. Bush, Commencement Address at West Point:

     A few of you have followed in the path of the perfect West Point graduate, Robert E. Lee, who never received a single demerit in four years. Some of you followed in the path of the imperfect graduate, Ulysses S. Grant, who had his fair share of demerits, and said the happiest day of his life was "the day I left West Point." (Laughter.)

3. That which one merits or deserves, either of good or ill; desert.
   • c. 1550s, Nicholas Udall, Ralph Roister Doister

     Leave here thy body, death has her demerit

   • 1603, Plutarch, “What Signifieth this Word Ei, Engraven over the Dore of Apolloes Temple in the City of Delphi”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Philosophie, Commonlie Called, The Morals […], London: […] Arnold Hatfield, OCLC 1051546006, page 1354:

     But when firſt Cleobulus the tyrant of the Lindians, and then Periander the tyrant likewiſe of Corinth (who had neither of them any one jot of vertue or wiſdome) by the greatneſſe of their power, by the number of their friends, and by many benefits and demerits whereby they obliged their adherents, acquired forcibly this reputation, in deſpite of all uſurped the name of Sages; and to this purpoſe cauſed to be ſpred ſowen and divulged throughout all Greece certaine odde ſentences and notable ſayings, as well as thoſe of others, wherewith the former Sages, above named were diſcontented.

• discredit

• merit

demerit (third-person singular simple present demerits, present participle demeriting, simple past and past participle demerited)

1. (transitive, archaic) To deserve.
   • 1840, Alexander Campbell, Dolphus Skinner, A discussion of the doctrines of the endless misery and universal salvation (page 351)

     You hold that every sin is an infinite evil, demeriting endless punishment.

2. (transitive, archaic) To depreciate or cry down.
   • 1576, John Woolton, The Christian Manuell

     Faith by her own dignity and worthiness doth not demerit justice and righteousness; but receiveth and embraceth the same offered unto us in the gospel […]

• detemir, dimeter, merited, mitered, red time, retimed

Borrowed from French démérite.

demerit n (plural demerite)

1. (obsolete) lack of merit

• demerit in Academia Română, Micul dicționar academic, ediția a II-a, Bucharest: Univers Enciclopedic, 2010. →ISBN