affront
Americannoun
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affronts
plural
verb (used with object)
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affronts,
present (3rd person singular)
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affronted,
past participle, past
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affronting
present participle
noun
verb
-
to insult, esp openly
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to offend the pride or dignity of
-
obsolete to confront defiantly
Synonym Usage
See insult.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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affrontednessnoun
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affronternoun
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reaffrontnoun
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unaffrontedadjective
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affrontedlyadverb
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affrontinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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affrontsimple
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affrontssimple
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have affrontedperfect
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has affrontedperfect
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am affrontingprogressive
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are affrontingprogressive
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is affrontingprogressive
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have been affrontingperfect progressive
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has been affrontingperfect progressive
Past
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affrontedsimple
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had affrontedperfect
-
was affrontingprogressive
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were affrontingprogressive
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had been affrontingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of affront
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English afrounten, from Middle French af(f)ronter “to strike in the face,” from unattested Vulgar Latin affrontāre, derivative of Latin phrase ad frontem “at or toward the forehead” (as the seat of one's feelings or dignity). See ad-, front
Explanation
An affront is an action that causes offense. If someone blows smoke in your face after you've asked him to put out his cigarette, you would consider it an affront. Affronter was an old French word meaning "to confront" or "slap in the face." It's from the Latin, ad frontem, meaning "to the face." Sure, a slap in the face would still be considered an affront, but other non-physical actions would also count. Some would even call a misplaced apostrophe an affront to the English language. Don't confuse affront with effrontery, which means "presumptuousness."
Vocabulary lists containing affront
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
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"The Book Thief" by Markus Zusak, Part Four
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Our Town
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
For them, Dannon’s move is one last affront.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 3, 2026
Opposition has also coalesced around religious appeals from a theologically diverse group of residents, leaders and politicians who see data center development as an affront to their most sacred values.
From Salon ● Aug. 3, 2026
Soccer, Luna believes, represents an affront to the individualistic mindset that plagues today’s world because, by nature, it must happen in community.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2026
Founded the same year Osborn’s Patum Peperium appeared, the magazine took news of the paste’s demise as an almost personal affront.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 1, 2026
This latest affront was too much for the students to bear.
From "Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution" by Ji-li Jiang
The exploitation of the poor, migrants and women are also described as affronts to human dignity.
From BBC ● Apr. 8, 2024
Californians are unsettled, anxious and, in some cases, livid over homelessness, soaring gas prices, obscene housing costs, crime and all manner of affronts that undermine California’s golden promise — not to mention their day-to-day lives.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 8, 2022
But others worry that the postponement will have a chilling effect on institutions, making them wary of the very thing museums are meant to do: present art that provokes, stimulates and sometimes even affronts.
From New York Times ● May 1, 2022
Each of these tiny slights and affronts can be chalked up to the usual cluelessness and fractiousness of any given oral argument.
From Slate ● Nov. 1, 2021
THE man Dante Alighieri received unforgivable affronts and insults from the world; and the poet Dante Alighieri bequeathed his immortal curse to it, in the sublime malediction of the Inferno.
From Pierre; or The Ambiguities by Herman Melville
"He brings in the female demographic because he is so sexy - but he appeals to men. He's an honest, good, authentic, down-to-earth type of individual. So you don't really get affronted by him."
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
An afterthought if not a redheaded stepchild, though expect affronted fellow media outlets to freak out because of what NBC News once was, not what it is.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 30, 2026
But it wasn’t just Catholics who were affronted.
From Slate ● Apr. 15, 2026
Catholic bishops Monday, warning that the forceful removal of immigrants affronted the "infinite and transcendent dignity" accorded to all human beings and would "end badly."
From Salon ● Feb. 11, 2025
“Excuse you. I said I got this,” he says, affronted.
From "Split the Sky" by Marie Arnold
He was a peacock: intent on blinding small people with his brilliance, affronting an older generation he detested and belittling everyone but himself - especially Vivienne.
From BBC ● Dec. 29, 2022
He added that the imposing structure of his 1881 novel was laid on a “single small cornerstone, the conception of a certain young woman affronting her destiny.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 3, 2017
It’s a mildly affronting experience that — as with some other signifiers of the modern world, a child’s noisy video game included — seems to help push him into nature.
From New York Times ● Sep. 1, 2015
This avoids needlessly affronting the actors who were considered but passed over, or admitting that some actors turned down the preferred parts.
From Time Magazine Archive
But in his eagerness to secure the alliance of Florence, he committed the fatal mistake of affronting the Venetians.
From Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 by Julia Mary Cartwright Ady
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
