1. Word finder
  2. Word definitions
  3. dispel

Find the word definition

What is "dispel"

Crossword clues for dispel

dispel
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
dispel
verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
dispel/lift the gloom (=make people feel less sad)
▪ Now for some good news to dispel the gloom.
ease/allay/dispel sb’s fears (=help someone stop being afraid)
▪ Frank eased my fears about not being able to speak the local language.
explode/dispel/debunk a myth (=show that it is not true)
▪ Our goal is to debunk the myth that science is boring.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ NOUN
doubt
▪ Jean had even managed to dispel my doubts about your sincerity.
▪ He worked to dispel his doubts about his friend as though to pass another test, like his ordeal in the park.
▪ Athletics: Morrell dispels fitness doubts.
▪ Schoonover hopes that having the theater functioning will finally dispel any lingering doubts that the project is moving forward.
▪ It grew rapidly, however, soon dispelling all doubts.
▪ A formal papal judgement on this point would have dispelled all doubts.
fear
▪ The outcome of yesterday's case could help dispel these fears.
▪ Colonel Calderon tried to dispel their fears and to persuade them that no attempt on their lives was contemplated.
myth
▪ The intensive study of demographic records through the technique of family reconstitution has dispelled many myths.
▪ It further calls for discussion within the trade union movement on this question, with a view to dispelling the myths that surround homosexuality.
▪ In this respect there is sometimes a need to dispel some of the myths which surround alcohol.
▪ It aims at dispelling the myths about old age and at building a network of associations concerned with the issues of aging.
▪ Direct contact helps dispel myths and dissolves stereotypes.
▪ Before proceeding further it would perhaps be as well to dispel one or two myths.
notion
▪ These two fine packages should dispel that notion.
■ VERB
help
▪ They may help to dispel some of the arrogant delusions prevalent in the country.
▪ A feeling for chronology, gradually acquired, should help to dispel confusion.
try
▪ Colonel Calderon tried to dispel their fears and to persuade them that no attempt on their lives was contemplated.
▪ Hicks brushed aside the blue haze of his cigar and felt suddenly that he was trying to dispel more than cigar smoke.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ In an interview Monday, the Foreign Affairs Secretary tried to dispel doubts about his handling of the crisis.
▪ The Central Bank attempted to dispel rumours of a possible financial crisis.
▪ We hope to dispel the belief that scientists work in isolation in windowless rooms.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ But that discomfiture is considerably dispelled by the infrequency of prior-restraint cases.
▪ Fearsome worry about the horrible outcomes of not doing schoolwork is difficult to dispel.
▪ Her foster brother's misinformation must be dispelled, but what did she say?
▪ Milton has already dispelled our traditional view of an awesome, bestial figure, in favour of one who possesses a destroyed beauty.
▪ Rising to his feet, he touched the light switch, dispelling the gathering gloom, before striding through to his office.
▪ Such anxieties, however, were soon dispelled.
▪ We shall never be friends until both your anger is dispelled and my guilt atoned.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dispel

Dispel \Dis*pel"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Dispelled; p. pr. & vb. n. Dispelling.] [L. dispellere; dis- + pellere to push, drive. See Pulse a beating.] To drive away by scattering, or so to cause to vanish; to clear away; to banish; to dissipate; as, to dispel a cloud, vapors, cares, doubts, illusions.

[Satan] gently raised their fainting courage, and dispelled their fears.
--Milton.

I saw myself the lambent easy light Gild the brown horror, and dispel the night.
--Dryden.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
dispel

c.1400, dispelen, from Latin dispellere "drive apart," from dis- "away" (see dis-) + pellere "to drive, push" (see pulse (n.1)). Since the meaning is "to drive away in different directions" it should not have as an object a single, indivisible thing (you can dispel suspicion, but not an accusation). Related: Dispelled; dispelling.

Wiktionary
dispel

vb. To drive away by scattering, or to cause to vanish; to clear away; to banish; to dissipate.

WordNet
dispel

  1. v. force to go away; used both with concrete and metaphoric meanings; "Drive away potential burglars"; "drive away bad thoughts"; "dispel doubts"; "The supermarket had to turn back many disappointed customers" [syn: chase away, drive out, turn back, drive away, drive off, run off]

  2. to cause to separate and go in different directions; "She waved her hand and scattered the crowds" [syn: disperse, dissipate, break up, scatter]

  3. [also: dispelling, dispelled]

Usage examples of "dispel".

I sighed and rubbed my face, willing the vision of Akkadian bloodshed to dispel.

Alyssa rubbed the goose bumps on her arms, trying to dispel asudden chill.

Wine was called for, both to dispel the humiliation she had experienced throughout the day, and to relax her before she started dinner and tried to figure out how she was going to pay Belton for his work.

She pressed close to the window and pushed her face into one of the open panes, taking deep breaths to dispel the aromas of the cabin, though the smell of the harbor was no great improvement, rife as it was with the smell of dead fish, sewage, and baking mud.

She rubbed her eyes and blinked, aware that her concentration was dispelling unsettling thoughts about Jinny Hoolets pond.

I had to make, and all the dignity I tried to assume was dispelled by the comical squish-squishing of my moist shoes, a sound horrendously amplified in this vaulted chamber.

Soho was one of a famous group of thirty-five Japanese youths, known as the Kumamoto band, who in 1875 climbed a hill in their native domain of Kumamoto in Kyushu and pledged themselves to Christianity and to propagation of the faith in order to dispel ignorance and enlighten the people.

For some minutes great masses rolled over the surface of the sea, then a breeze sprang up, which rapidly dispelled the mist.

Even the fact that at the expulsion of the Company of Jesus from America no treasure at all was found at any of their colleges or missions did not dispel the conviction that they owned rich mines.

The Nickles acted as a buffer, allowing her and Alec to avoid direct conversation with each other, but nothing could dispel the underlying tension between them.

The cheery blaze helped to dispel the cold Scottish weather creeping in through the roughhewn stone walls of the restored farmhouse.

The gloom was very feebly dispelled by a wavering gaslight in the shedlike front of the shop.

Hence it is evident, that on the part of the adherence, a subsequent mortal sin does not cause the return of mortal sins previously dispelled, else it would follow that by a sin of wastefulness a man would be brought back to the habit or disposition of avarice previously dispelled, so that one contrary would be the cause of another, which is impossible.

Spell traps lurked within the network, killing spells that would be triggered by the breach or inartful dispelling of a ward.

Tim Willows felt the return of his former depression, which had been momentarily dispelled by his triumph over the dog.