Etymology Explorer › English

Where does “vengeful” come from?

I need to work through this etymology chain carefully, but I notice the chain provided appears malformed with repetitions and unclear ordering. Let me identify what's actually present: - English vengeful (modern) - Middle English -ful - Old English -ful - Latin vindicare - English -ive - Latin -ivus The chain seems to show that "vengeful" combines "venge" (from Latin vindicare, meaning to avenge/punish) with the suffix "-ful" (from Old English -ful, from Latin -fulls/fullus meaning full). However, the chain shows "English -ive" and "Latin -ivus" which don't clearly connect to "vengeful." Given the instruction to state only what the chain supports and the apparent confusion in the provided chain, here's my best interpretation: Vengeful combines the English noun venge, derived from Latin vin

vengeful (English): Vindictive or wanting vengeance

Definitions

  1. Vindictive or wanting vengeance

Ancestry of “vengeful”, step by step

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1EnglishvengeTo avenge; to punish; to revenge
2Middle Englishvengen—
3Old FrenchvengerAlternative form of vengier
4Latinvindicāre—

Words derived from “vengeful”

  • vengefulness
  • vengefully
  • unvengeful
  • unvengefulness
Every word from Latin vindicāre →