propitiate
Americanverb (used with object)
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propitiates,
present (3rd person singular)
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propitiated,
past participle, past
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propitiating
present participle
verb
Usage
What does propitiate mean? Propitiate means to gain the favor of or make things right with someone, especially after having done something wrong. The noun form of propitiate is propitiation. Close synonyms of propitiate are conciliate and appease. Propitiate is commonly used in a religious context. It’s especially used in Christianity to refer to the act of propitiation that Christians believe Jesus made to atone for sin—or to the atonement that Christians believe they should make to God. Example: To gain redemption, we must do our best to propitiate—to earn the favor we have lost.
Synonym Usage
See appease.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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propitiationnoun
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propitiatornoun
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nonpropitiableadjective
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nonpropitiativeadjective
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propitiableadjective
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propitiatiousadjective
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propitiativeadjective
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unpropitiableadjective
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unpropitiatedadjective
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unpropitiatingadjective
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unpropitiativeadjective
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propitiatinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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propitiatesimple
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propitiatessimple
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have propitiatedperfect
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has propitiatedperfect
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am propitiatingprogressive
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are propitiatingprogressive
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is propitiatingprogressive
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have been propitiatingperfect progressive
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has been propitiatingperfect progressive
Past
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propitiatedsimple
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had propitiatedperfect
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was propitiatingprogressive
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were propitiatingprogressive
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had been propitiatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of propitiate
1635–45; < Latin propitiātus, past participle of propitiāre to appease. See propitious, -ate 1
Explanation
If you forgot flowers on your grandma's birthday, you can still propitiate her by sending a bouquet the next day. Propitiate means to appease someone or make them happy by doing a particular thing. Handy strategy for lovers, too. One of the most common uses of propitiate historically was in the sense of appeasing the gods, often with a gift in the form of an animal or human sacrifice. Fortunately, for most people today flowers and candy will do the trick. But then again, some Moms can be tough to appease.
Vocabulary lists containing propitiate
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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:
Before he was reinstated, the Anderson School’s Faculty Executive Committee tried to propitiate the mob by announcing itself “saddened” by Klein’s “troubling conduct.”
From Washington Post ● Oct. 8, 2021
I suspect that Oskar probably still believes that it was just something in my nature: that somebody needed to be sacrificed on the altar on the way to propitiate whatever, and that that was him.
From Slate ● Jun. 28, 2016
Was it just to tell the date or propitiate some mountain deity?
From The Guardian ● Feb. 8, 2013
But under the logic of the bailout, the markets were in charge, and the overarching aim of the government was to propitiate them to avoid disaster.
From New York Times ● Jun. 25, 2010
His dæmon growled softly; the golden monkey dropped his head low to propitiate her.
From "The Amber Spyglass" by Philip Pullman
The Indian yields to it a sort of worship, propitiates it with offerings of tobacco, thanks it in prosperity, and upbraids it in disaster.
From The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century by Francis Parkman
While it powerfully propitiates the reader, it almost converts condemnation into compassion.
From Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey by Joseph Cottle
Sacrifice propitiates God, but mercy imitates Him, and imitation is the perfection of divine service.
From Expositions of Holy Scripture : St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII by Alexander Maclaren
They believe that shaving the head of the dead propitiates the deities in their favour.
From Sketches of Japanese Manners and Customs by Jacob Mortimer Wier Silver
Ages, empires, civilisations pass, and leave some members even of educated mankind still, in certain points, on the level of the savage who propitiates with gifts, or addresses with prayers, the spirits of the dead.
From Cock Lane and Common-Sense by Andrew Lang
True to form, Iranians haven't been propitiated by such gestures.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 8, 2026
I promise I won't let our multithreaded discussion veer too far down the red carpet, but the Oscars are the Oscars; their vestal fires burn, their gods must be propitiated.
From Slate ● Jan. 16, 2014
Villagers prevailed upon construction workers to stop work until the dragon had been propitiated.
From Time Magazine Archive
In India, however, the accused was feared and terribly propitiated by millions as Kali, goddess of death and catastrophe, wife-conqueror of the eternal Siva, the dancer.
From Time Magazine Archive
The gods had to be propitiated, and a vast industry of priests and oracles arose to make the gods less angry.
From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan
He suggests that they may have perceived the cave walls as a kind of membrane between their world and the spirits, and thus created their paintings as a means of propitiating them.
From The Guardian ● May 23, 2020
On this teacher’s advice, the Dalai Lama had himself been propitiating this dangerous spirit – along with innumerable other esoteric rituals – as part of his daily four hours of meditation and spiritual exercise.
From Newsweek
Though England boasted herself mistress of the seas, and in token thereof English admirals carried brooms at their mastheads, she nevertheless spent four hundred thousand dollars annually in propitiating these African despots.
From Gentlemen Rovers by E. Alexander (Edward Alexander) Powell
At this point, moreover, had ceased the pretended influence of Mohammad ibn Mohammad, Sultán of Tajúra, the utter futility of propitiating whom had long been sufficiently apparent.
From The Highlands of Ethiopia by William Cornwallis Harris
The Wanyamwezi being great travellers, they have numberless ways of propitiating the Musimo.
From Fetichism in West Africa Forty Years' Observations of Native Customs and Superstitions by Robert Hamill Nassau
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.
