ridicule

• IPA^(key): /ˈɹɪdɪkjuːl/

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• Hyphenation: rid‧i‧cule

The obsolete adjective is borrowed from French ridicule, from Latin rīdiculus (“laughable, comical, amusing, absurd, ridiculous”), from ridere (“to laugh”).

The noun is either from French, noun use of adjective, or from Latin rīdiculum, noun use of neuter of rīdiculus.

The verb is from the noun or else from French ridiculer, from ridicule.[1]

ridicule (third-person singular simple present ridicules, present participle ridiculing, simple past and past participle ridiculed)

1. (transitive) to criticize or disapprove of someone or something through scornful jocularity; to make fun of

   His older sibling constantly ridiculed him with sarcastic remarks.

• outlaugh

ridicule (countable and uncountable, plural ridicules)

1. derision; mocking or humiliating words or behaviour
   • 1738, Alexander Pope, Epilogue to the Satires: Dialogue II

     Safe from the Bar, the Pulpit, and the Throne, / Yet touch'd and sham'd by Ridicule alone.

2. An object of sport or laughter; a laughing stock.
   • 1857, Henry Thomas Buckle, History of Civilization in England

     [Marlborough] was so miserably ignorant, that his deficiencies made him the ridicule of his contemporaries.

   • 1563 March 30​, John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], OCLC 64451939:

     To the people […] but a trifle, to the king but a ridicule.

3. The quality of being ridiculous; ridiculousness.
   • 1710 April 1 (Gregorian calendar)​, Joseph Addison; Richard Steele [et al.], “TUESDAY, March 21, 1709–1710”, in The Spectator, number 18; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume I, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, OCLC 191120697:

     to see the ridicule of this monstrous practice

   • 1838 (date written)​, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VI, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], published 1842, OCLC 1000392275, page 65:

     More keenly alive perhaps than any of her sisters to the little ridicules that belonged to Mrs. Palmer's character, she yet saw how small was their importance, and that Mrs. Palmer was not only a better but a happier person than most of those with whom she was acquainted.

• See also Thesaurus:ridicule

• deride
• derision
• ridiculable
• ridiculous
• ridiculosity

• humiliation

ridicule (comparative more ridicule, superlative most ridicule)

1. (obsolete) ridiculous
   • late 17th century, John Aubrey, Brief Lives

     This action […] became so ridicule.

From French ridicule, probably jocular alteration of réticule.

ridicule (plural ridicules)

1. (now historical) A small woman's handbag; a reticule. [from 18th c.]
   • c. 1825, Frances Burney, Journals and Letters, Penguin 2001, p. 455:

     I hastily drew my empty hand from my Ridicule.

   • 1838, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy’s Progress. […], volume (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), London: Richard Bentley, […], OCLC 558204586:

     ‘Pockets, women's ridicules, houses, mailcoaches […] ,’ said Mr. Claypole.

• ridicule in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• ridicule in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911

Borrowed from Latin rīdiculus.

• IPA^(key): /ʁi.di.kyl/

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ridicule (plural ridicules)

1. ridiculous (all meanings)

• “ridicule”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

From rīdiculus (“laughable; ridiculous”), from rīdeō (“to laugh; mock”).

rīdiculē (comparative rīdiculius, superlative rīdiculissimē)

1. laughably, amusingly
2. absurdly, ridiculously

• perrīdiculē

• “ridicule”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “ridicule”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• ridicule in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette