smite
Americanverb (used with object)
-
smites,
present (3rd person singular)
-
smote,
past participle, past
-
smit,
past (Obsolete)
-
smitten,
past participle
-
smiting
present participle
-
to strike or hit hard, with or as with the hand, a stick, or other weapon.
She smote him on the back with her umbrella.
-
to deliver or deal (a blow, hit, etc.) by striking hard.
-
to strike down, injure, or slay.
His sword had smitten thousands.
-
to afflict or attack with deadly or disastrous effect.
smitten by polio.
-
to affect mentally or morally with a sudden pang.
His conscience smote him.
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to affect suddenly and strongly with a specified feeling.
They were smitten with terror.
-
to impress favorably; charm; enamor.
He was smitten by her charms.
verb (used without object)
-
smites,
present (3rd person singular)
-
smote,
past participle, past
-
smit,
past (Obsolete)
-
smitten,
past participle
-
smiting
present participle
idioms
verb
-
to strike with a heavy blow or blows
-
to damage with or as if with blows
-
to afflict or affect severely
smitten with flu
-
to afflict in order to punish
-
to strike forcibly or abruptly
the sun smote down on him
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
smitesimple
-
smitessimple
-
have smittenperfect
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have smoteperfect
-
has smittenperfect
-
has smoteperfect
-
am smitingprogressive
-
are smitingprogressive
-
is smitingprogressive
-
have been smitingperfect progressive
-
has been smitingperfect progressive
Past
-
smitsimple
-
smotesimple
-
had smittenperfect
-
had smoteperfect
-
was smitingprogressive
-
were smitingprogressive
-
had been smitingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of smite
First recorded before 900; Middle English smiten, Old English smītan; cognate with German schmeissen “to throw,” Dutch smijten
Explanation
To smite is to strike with a heavy blow. If you’re playing an ancient Norse warrior in a play, you might get to smite your enemy with a club. Smite comes from the old English for striking or smearing. You’re most likely to find it reading Biblical stories or mythologies, for example, where the thunderbolt of Zeus smites some misbehaving Greek fellow. The past participle of this verb is the cool word smitten, which is what you say about someone who's fallen head over heels for something or someone, that is, their emotions have been struck.
Vocabulary lists containing smite
The Hobbit
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"To Build a Fire," Vocabulary from the short story
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Beowulf vocabulary
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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:
“Curtis and I served together in the state Senate, he is your state senator. He is Republican. I am a Democrat. But when we team up in a bipartisan manner, we will smite evil.”
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 25, 2024
He can create countless jobs with a flick of his fingers, and smite al-Qaeda leaders with the lightning that flies from his open palms.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 9, 2022
On it, we hear a 31-year-old woman impersonating her 19-year-old self reflecting on her 15-year-old self, and doing it all to smite the men who hoped to seize control of her songs.
From New York Times ● Dec. 22, 2021
Will he lose his head, or is the Green Knight’s bark worse than his smite?
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 29, 2021
Before I could speak or Katz could seize a log with which to smite her dead, she said, “Well, I don’t mind if I do,” and ate it in two bites.
From "A Walk in the Woods" by Bill Bryson
Indecent exposure … Fantasy author Terry Goodkind has publicly castigated a pirate of his ebook Wizard hero Richard Rahl smites wrongdoers with his Sword of Truth.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 11, 2012
"He plays silly shots to get out and bowls lots of pies but inbetween times he smites big sixes and bowls unplayable deliveries."
From The Guardian ● Jan. 12, 2011
Pareja nods away a long high ball, but it drops out to the onrushing Russian, who smites the thing first time, dipping and fizzing past Dykan in the Spartak goal.
From The Guardian ● Oct. 19, 2010
Wake while our song smites the sky, For now, ere we leave you, We heartily give you Plastered in Paris.
From Time Magazine Archive
Never you be afeard, Ratie, Him'll take kere ob you, an' all sich as you, bekase He loves dem dat He smites and afflicts.
From The Freedmen's Book by Lydia Maria Francis Child
But we say likewise, thrive, rise, smit, writ, abid, rid.
From A Grammar of the English Tongue by Samuel Johnson
Next they are smit with wonder at the black shells of a wagon-load of live lobsters packed in rock-weed for the country-market.
From Twice Told Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Many who belonged not to the orders, smit with desire for the glory of martyrdom, cast the mantles of Templars around them, and went cheerfully to death as such.
From Secret Societies of the Middle Ages by Thomas Keightley
With honors all insatiate, With curst ambition smit, Too far, alas!
From Black Beetles in Amber by Ambrose Bierce
Earl March look'd on his dying child, And, smit with grief to view her— The youth, he cried, whom I exiled Shall be restored to woo her.
From The Golden Treasury Selected from the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language and arranged with Notes by Various
I’ve never touched a gun nor smote anything larger than a stink bug.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 18, 2025
Like the Boston Red Sox finally beating the Yankees in 2004, Buffalo smote their longtime nemesis in epic fashion.
From New York Times ● Jan. 16, 2022
So went Robert Downey Jr. from the presence of Jimmy Fallon and smote the entire internet with an unwatchable video.
From Slate ● Apr. 26, 2018
In which arena rock was smote upside the backside by the punk movement.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 8, 2016
The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him.
From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien
However, BBC Sport understands Arteta has become so smitten with the notion of signing Vinicius that he is viewed internally as the club's number one target.
From BBC ● Jul. 27, 2026
But he quickly was smitten with the game and the tournament — so much so he has attended every World Cup since 1990.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 2, 2026
The Wall Street Journal reported this week that Trump is so smitten with his Florsheim dress shoes that he shod his whole Cabinet in the same footwear.
From Slate ● Mar. 14, 2026
The adaptation retained the 18th-century setting and the central plot: The teenage siren Manon, on her way to a convent, runs off with a smitten young aristocrat, the Chevalier Des Grieux.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 17, 2026
It’s no wonder poor Katherine is smitten with him.
From "Dread Nation" by Justina Ireland
Mr. Harbour shines as the jolly, but surprisingly in shape, fat man smiting foes with a Christmas star, icicles and even a lethal candy cane.
From Washington Times ● Feb. 3, 2023
“Even in Akhenaten’s time, so much of her iconography was that of a male king, smiting enemies and doing things like that.”
From Scientific American ● Nov. 4, 2022
Sure they’re great for smiting your enemies, but I bet they’re also perfect for quickly taking you to a tropical getaway.
From The Verge ● Jun. 28, 2016
“For example, on certain relief blocks from Luxor and Karnak temples she’s shown smiting Egypt’s enemies, a position which is usually reserved for the king alone.”
From National Geographic ● Nov. 28, 2015
But he’d also expected Ashmodai to smite him on the spot, whatever smiting entailed, once he realized what Boaz had done.
From "Night Owls" by A.R. Vishny
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.
