assuage
Americanverb (used with object)
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assuages,
present (3rd person singular)
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assuaged,
past participle, past
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assuaging
present participle
verb
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to soothe, moderate, or relieve (grief, pain, etc)
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to give relief to (thirst, appetite, etc); satisfy
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to pacify; calm
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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assuagesimple
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assuagessimple
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have assuagedperfect
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has assuagedperfect
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am assuagingprogressive
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are assuagingprogressive
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is assuagingprogressive
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have been assuagingperfect progressive
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has been assuagingperfect progressive
Past
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assuagedsimple
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had assuagedperfect
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was assuagingprogressive
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were assuagingprogressive
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had been assuagingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of assuage
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English aswagen, from Old French asouagier, from unrecorded Vulgar Latin assuāviāre, equivalent to Latin as- as- + -suāviāre, verbal derivative of Latin suāvis “agreeable to the taste, pleasant” ( cf. suave; akin to sweet )
Explanation
If you assuage an unpleasant feeling, you make it go away. Assuaging your hunger by eating a bag of marshmallows may cause you other unpleasant feelings. The most common things that we assuage are fears, concerns, guilt, grief, anxiety, and anger. That makes a lot of sense — these are all things we seek relief from. The word comes from Old French assouagier, from the Latin root suavis, "sweet" — think of adding a bit of honey to something unpleasant. A word with a similar meaning is mollify.
Vocabulary lists containing assuage
100 SAT Words Beginning with "A"
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To Kill a Mockingbird
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The Giver
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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:
The quarterly results helped assuage the concerns of some investors and analysts who have recently been worried about a “SaaSpocalypse,” in which corporate-software companies’ expensive off-the-shelf products would be replaced with cheaper AI-concocted versions.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 17, 2026
The result has left many in Michigan’s Jewish community wary of El-Sayed and looking for outreach from him and his campaign to assuage their concerns.
From Slate ● Aug. 20, 2026
The theme park has made outreach into the neighborhood over the years in an attempt to assuage concerns, be it distributing fliers or attending community meetings.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 24, 2026
Then against Canada they were eventually comfortable, but it was not a high-quality win to assuage doubters ahead of a possible meeting with France in the last eight.
From BBC ● Jul. 4, 2026
He was an old-timer and apparently had thought of a way to assuage his own irritating feelings of loss of control.
From "Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing" by Ted Conover
To Friedman, the answer to the first question assuages concern about the second.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 12, 2024
A sort of penance, where by reading all the nasty comments under every post she assuages some of her guilt, as a zealot whips himself bloody to atone for sin?
From Slate ● Jan. 31, 2024
Having Castillo atop the rotation certainly assuages many of those feelings.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 5, 2023
But now vaccines are available to all, making the one-ring a more comfortable space, and the lineup is meaningfully similar to last year’s, a gesture that assuages any feelings of having missed out.
From New York Times ● Nov. 25, 2022
It is "living among real possessions of his own" which calms the child, and assuages those desires which consume his precious powers in the vanity of illusion.
From Spontaneous Activity in Education by Maria Montessori
Nor has the boom in stock prices assuaged discontent.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
That hasn’t assuaged concerns among some that a dot-com-style bubble may be building, especially given the sharp run-up.
From MarketWatch ● May 28, 2026
In an instant, Urbina’s fears had been assuaged.
From Salon ● May 2, 2026
That was partly assuaged when the cast, made up of up-and-coming talent rather than established names, was announced.
From BBC ● Mar. 22, 2026
Her fears were not fully assuaged until she became pregnant early in the new year and delivered a healthy boy, John Eric Lawrence, in mid-October.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Given the stock’s retreat over recent months, stronger-than-expected results, amid low expectations, “could go a long way in assuaging several of these investor concerns.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 15, 2026
The goal was to provide enterprise customers more powerful tools while assuaging the White House’s concerns that they could be weaponized by bad actors.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026
The presence of the Ivorian army in the remote and long-neglected northeast, hundreds of kilometres from the economic capital Abidjan, has succeeded in assuaging locals' concerns -- to an extent.
From Barron's ● Oct. 20, 2025
Universities, far from assuaging that constant fear, should fight to make it a reality.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 5, 2025
During the first months of their marriage, he called Celia every night, his gentle voice assuaging her.
From "Dreaming in Cuban" by Cristina García
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.
