berate

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The Word of the Day for August 29 is: 

berate   \bih-RAYT\   verb
     : to scold or condemn vehemently and at length 

Example sentence:
     I quit my job after my boss berated me for addressing a letter incorrectly.

Did you know?
     "Berate" and one sense of the verb "rate" can both mean "to scold angrily 
or violently." This sense of "rate" was first recorded in the 14th century, 
roughly a century before the now more familiar sense meaning "to estimate the 
value of." We know that "berate" was probably formed by combining "be" and the 
older sense of "rate," but the origins of "rate" itself are somewhat more 
obscure. We can trace the word back to the Middle English form "raten," but 
beyond that things get a little murky. It's possible that "rate," and by 
extension "berate," derives from the same ancient word that led to the Swedish 
"rata" (meaning "to find blame, despise") and earlier the Old Norse "hrata" 
("to fall, stagger"), but this is uncertain.





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