spurned

American  

[spurnd] / spɜrnd /

adjective

1. treated or rejected with scorn or contempt.

   It should be instructive to us that some of the spurned recommendations were very effective when belatedly implemented years after they were made.

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verb

1. the simple past tense and past participle of spurn.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• unspurned
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of spurned

spurn ( def. ) + -ed ² ( def. )

Explanation

Someone who's spurned has been abandoned or rejected, usually by a romantic interest. If your significant other breaks up with you unexpectedly, you might feel spurned. It's not easy to be a spurned lover, since the adjective implies total rejection by someone you love. A spurned groom, for example, might wait at the church on his wedding day for a bride who never shows up. The Old English root word of spurned makes this rejection pretty clear: spurnan means "to kick away, reject, scorn, or despise."

Example Sentences

Norwegian Ruud spurned five match points in the third set against Safiullin, by which time he said he had already started to feel cramping in his legs.

From BBC • May 25, 2026

Then there are the misses, with 58 big chances spurned in four years.

From BBC • May 2, 2026

Netflix won the bidding for the storied studio and HBO in December, prompting the spurned Paramount executives to launch a multipronged strategy to scuttle the Netflix deal.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 23, 2026

As Kyle Cheney reported in Politico, at least 360 judges have spurned the government’s reasoning in more than 3,000 cases.

From Slate • Feb. 10, 2026

She dressed plainly and modestly, spurned every extravagance, and never turned down the chance to put money in the bank.

From "Hidden Figures" by Margot Lee Shetterly

Related Words

• decayed
• deserted
• ignored
• overlooked
• undervalued
• unused
• unwanted