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What is "betray"

Crossword clues for betray

betray
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
betray
verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
betray your country (=be disloyal, especially by giving secrets to other countries)
▪ He betrayed his country for the sake of communism.
betray your ideals (=to do something that is not acceptable according to your ideals)
▪ He argues that Lenin betrayed his revolutionary ideals.
betray/compromise your principles (=do something that is against your principles)
▪ I knew I could lie to help him, but it would be betraying my principles.
betrayed...trust (=did something bad even though he trusted you)
▪ You betrayed your father’s trust.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
never
▪ In truth, he was never betrayed.
■ NOUN
body
▪ Would her body betray her and fight to preserve its fleeing spirit, causing lingering agony instead of swift and final oblivion?
▪ They could see that her body was already betraying her.
▪ But his body betrayed his words as he dressed for the trip home.
▪ Her body began to betray her.
▪ But as John Swensson aged, his body began to betray him.
▪ But my body always betrayed me.
confidence
▪ I can't tell you what Melanie was asking me because I don't betray other people's confidences.
country
▪ But why should some one murder him decades later because he betrayed his country and worked for the Soviet Union?
▪ You have betrayed your country and your religion.
▪ I thought we would all rather betray our country than our friends.
emotion
▪ But by not so much as a flicker of an eyebrow did he betray his emotions.
▪ Clare suddenly noticed that Elinor's hands were gripping the bedclothes, betraying the emotion hidden by her quiet words.
▪ Her handsome features betrayed no emotion as Julia stood aside to give her passage.
▪ The sergeant glanced across at Blanche but her face betrayed no emotion at all.
face
▪ He continued to watch as Gentle got up, his face betraying a mournful empathy with Gentle's bruising.
▪ Their faces betrayed no sign of human warmth.
▪ His eyes were bright and his face betrayed a frustrated energy.
▪ His face of course betrayed his age.
▪ Karelius hoped his face did not betray him.
▪ Grey, thinning hair and a tired face betray years of active service.
▪ Her clear face betrayed no grief or anxiety at all.
▪ His face betrayed him to McAllister.
fact
▪ Never must she put herself in a position where she might be tempted to betray the fact that she loved him.
▪ The sometimes inattentive audience only betrayed the fact that they were as much participants in the total popular-cultural spectacle as the performers.
▪ Instead she stood with her eyes closed, lest they betrayed the fact that she found him to be disturbing to her.
ideal
▪ He ridicules but secretly envies Saburov, who accepts professional obscurity and poverty rather than compromising his talent by betraying his artistic ideals.
people
▪ They practiced deception and betrayed their own people, and so created nothing that could be built upon.
▪ Because it's being betrayed by the people who are meant to govern it.
▪ The people who betrayed her people.
▪ The result is that we have been steadily betraying mentally-ill people for at least a century.
presence
▪ A thin squeaking betrayed the presence of two baby gold crests, precariously balanced on the branch of a larch.
▪ Or did they simply betray the presence of a lone woman in a dark deserted place?
▪ He veered to his right, not wanting to betray his presence with dust from the dry mud of the lane.
▪ He held his breath, not wanting to make the slightest sound that might betray his presence.
▪ The floor was covered with large red and white vinyl tiles, rubbed in ridges that betrayed the presence of flagstones underneath.
principle
▪ Who had persuaded the other to defect, to betray his fundamental principles in the name of personal loyalty?
trust
▪ The girl was betraying the trust that her parents had instilled into her all her young life.
▪ Adrian is shocked that Yasmin betrayed his trust.
▪ No wonder then that on the one occasion when television betrays his trust, his world fell apart.
▪ How could television betray Homer's trust?
▪ Estrada has been charged with bribery, corruption, violating the constitution and betraying the public trust.
▪ He was absolved, neither waking nor sleeping had he betrayed his trust.
▪ As imperial portraits attracted faith, so images of emperors who had betrayed their subjects' trust were treated with contempt.
▪ I couldn't stay with the Sisters because of Andrew; it would be betraying their trust.
voice
▪ His voice did not betray the slightly perturbed current of his thoughts.
woman
▪ But a man still, who could betray one woman with another.
■ VERB
feel
▪ In his heart he felt he was betraying something very new and delicate, but he could not stop himself.
▪ The civil rights workers felt betrayed.
▪ He had felt betrayed by the visit, after hoping to be lifted out of his crushing depression by it.
▪ His inconstancy infuriated liberals, who felt betrayed, and Republicans, whose positions he seemed to be stealing.
▪ I felt she had betrayed me and that I had no home.
▪ I really felt betrayed by my parents at that point.
▪ Some one he could want without feeling he was betraying all he believed in.
▪ The West was shocked and felt betrayed.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Barker's comments on Germany betrayed a woeful ignorance of history and recent politics.
▪ Conservatives felt betrayed when Bush raised taxes.
▪ Greene was denounced for betraying his Catholic beliefs and siding with the Communists.
▪ He betrayed his friends in order to save his own life.
▪ His words were calm, but his voice betrayed his very real concern and anxiety.
▪ I still have bitter feelings for Robert. What can I say? He completely betrayed my trust.
▪ If he feels any bitterness, his voice doesn't betray it.
▪ My husband lied to me and betrayed me.
▪ Olga's best friend betrayed her to the secret police.
▪ The documents betray a deep anti-Semitism in the country.
▪ The former federal agent betrayed his country and gave away vital military secrets.
▪ The new government has betrayed the ideals of the revolution.
▪ There are people who are prepared to betray their country for money.
▪ When I heard what she had said about me I felt angry and betrayed.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ He had felt betrayed by the visit, after hoping to be lifted out of his crushing depression by it.
▪ He is the golden youth whose promise is betrayed by his base appetites.
▪ Not by the slightest word or look did she betray to Miss Miggs that she knew she couldn't read.
▪ They could see that her body was already betraying her.
▪ Women can not betray me, for I have never made the mistake of trusting them.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Betray

Betray \Be*tray"\ (b[-e]*tr[=a]"), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Betrayed (-tr[=a]d"); p. pr. & vb. n. Betraying.] [OE. betraien, bitraien; pref. be- + OF. tra["i]r to betray, F. trahir, fr. L. tradere. See Traitor.]

  1. To deliver into the hands of an enemy by treachery or fraud, in violation of trust; to give up treacherously or faithlessly; as, an officer betrayed the city.

    Jesus said unto them, The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men.
    --Matt. xvii. 2

  2. 2. To prove faithless or treacherous to, as to a trust or one who trusts; to be false to; to deceive; as, to betray a person or a cause.

    But when I rise, I shall find my legs betraying me.
    --Johnson.

  3. To violate the confidence of, by disclosing a secret, or that which one is bound in honor not to make known.

    Willing to serve or betray any government for hire.
    --Macaulay.

  4. To disclose or discover, as something which prudence would conceal; to reveal unintentionally.

    Be swift to hear, but cautious of your tongue, lest you betray your ignorance.
    --T. Watts.

  5. To mislead; to expose to inconvenience not foreseen to lead into error or sin.

    Genius . . . often betrays itself into great errors.
    --T. Watts.

  6. To lead astray, as a maiden; to seduce (as under promise of marriage) and then abandon.

  7. To show or to indicate; -- said of what is not obvious at first, or would otherwise be concealed.

    All the names in the country betray great antiquity.
    --Bryant.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
betray

late 13c., bitrayen "mislead, deceive, betray," from be- + obsolete Middle English tray, from Old French traine "betrayal, deception, deceit," from trair (Modern French trahir) "betray, deceive," from Latin tradere "hand over," from trans- "across" (see trans-) + dare "to give" (see date (n.1)). Related: Betrayed; betraying.\n

Wiktionary
betray

vb. 1 To deliver into the hands of an enemy by treachery or fraud, in violation of trust; to give up treacherously or faithlessly; as, an officer betrayed the city. e.g. Quresh betrayed Sunil to marry Nuzhat 2 To prove faithless or treacherous to, as to a trust or one who trusts; to be false to; to deceive; as, to betray a person or a cause. 3 To violate the confidence of, by disclosing a secret, or that which one is bound in honor not to make known. 4 To disclose or discover, as something which prudence would conceal; to reveal unintentionally; to bewray.

WordNet
betray

  1. v. reveal unintentionally; "Her smile betrayed her true feelings" [syn: bewray]

  2. deliver to an enemy by treachery; "Judas sold Jesus"; "The spy betrayed his country" [syn: sell]

  3. disappoint, prove undependable to; abandon, forsake; "His sense of smell failed him this time"; "His strength finally failed him"; "His children failed him in the crisis" [syn: fail]

  4. be sexually unfaithful to one's partner in marriage; "She cheats on her husband"; "Might her husband be wandering?" [syn: cheat on, cheat, cuckold, wander]

  5. give away information about somebody; "He told on his classmate who had cheated on the exam" [syn: denounce, tell on, give away, rat, grass, shit, shop, snitch, stag]

  6. cause someone to believe an untruth; "The insurance company deceived me when they told me they were covering my house" [syn: deceive, lead astray] [ant: undeceive]

Wikipedia
Betray

Usage examples of "betray".

Belisarius betrayed the impotence of the conqueror, and accomplished the ruin of those unfortunate countries.

So desperate indeed did the situation of the son of Theodosius appear, to those who were the best acquainted with his strength and resources, that Jovius and Valens, his minister and his general, betrayed their trust, infamously deserted the sinking cause of their benefactor, and devoted their treacherous allegiance to the service of his more fortunate rival.

Fasskisters still had this bred-in drive to be ruled by royals, but they felt all betrayed and abandoned by their leaders, so they overcompensated with aggressive antimonarchical something or other.

But the same could not be said of the English nation, which had in his view most foully apostatized from its pure creed, and most perfidiously betrayed the high commission it had received from Heaven.

I was distracted with various inventions to supply her with pleasures, she very kindly- betrayed me to one of her former lovers at Oxford, by whose care and diligence I was immediately apprehended and committed to gaol.

On arriving there the troops not finding the Marshal at their head thought themselves betrayed, and a spirit of insurrection broke out among them.

The magnanimity of Julian was applauded and betrayed, by the arts of a noble Persian, who, in the cause of his country, had generously submitted to act a part full of danger, of falsehood, and of shame.

Neither Top nor Jup, who accompanied him, ever betrayed by their behavior that there was anything strange there, and yet more than once again the dog barked at the mouth of the well, which the engineer had before explored without result.

By discovering what had happened to the Barracuda, he had betrayed them.

Then they heard his slurping, which emphasized a difficulty--even in diners along the road, his beastlike inattention to custom would betray him and them.

It is easy, therefore, to deceive and betray it, to beguile it into confidence, and turn all its revelations against itself.

Years ago, in the time of Guzman Bento, he had been mixed up, it was whispered, in a conspiracy which was betrayed and, as people expressed it, drowned in blood.

Besides, since he had become again of some account, vague whispers had been heard that years ago, when fallen into disgrace and thrown into prison by Guzman Bento at the time of the so-called Great Conspiracy, he had betrayed some of his best friends amongst the conspirators.

Divest this passage of the latent sarcasm betrayed by the subsequent tone of the whole disquisition, and it might commence a Christian history written in the most Christian spirit of candor.

Almost all the flowers, the herbs, and the fruits, that grow in our European gardens, are of foreign extraction, which, in many cases, is betrayed even by their names: the apple was a native of Italy, and when the Romans had tasted the richer flavor of the apricot, the peach, the pomegranate, the citron, and the orange, they contented themselves with applying to all these new fruits the common denomination of apple, discriminating them from each other by the additional epithet of their country.