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aggravate

ag·gra·vate

aggravate

 
 
pronunciation:
ae gr veIt
features:
Word Combinations (verb), Word Parts
part of speech: verb
inflections: aggravates, aggravating, aggravated
definition 1: to make worse.
She aggravated the pain in her knee by walking too soon after she got hurt.
antonyms:
alleviate, appease, ease, heal, moderate, relieve, soothe
similar words:
deepen, heighten, increase, intensify
definition 2: (informal) to bother or annoy.
All of the noise on the playground aggravated me when I tried to read.
synonyms:
annoy, bother, exasperate, irritate
antonyms:
appease, please, soothe
similar words:
bug, disturb, hassle, pester, ruffle
Word Combinations  About this feature
adverb + (v.)aggravate far, greatly, incredibly, merely, occasionally
(v.)aggravate + adverb already
(v.)aggravate + nounHelp acne, allergy, ankle, anxiety, arthritis, assault, asthma, battery, circumstance, condition, conflict, crisis, decline, deficit, diabetes, difficulty, disease, division, drought, factor, hazard, hostility, inequality, inflammation, injury, kidnapping, knee, labor, manslaughter, nerve, offense, ozone, pain, pollution, poverty, problem, recipe, relation, shortage, sinus, situation, stress, symptom, tendency, tension, theft, wound  [See all][See only the most frequent]
derivations: aggravatingly (adv.), aggravator (n.)
Word Parts  About this feature
The word aggravate contains the following parts:
ag- Latin prefix that means to, toward
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The prefix ag- occurs in Latin loanwords. It is an assimilated form of ad- used before roots beginning with "g." See ad-.
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grav Latin root that means heavy
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-ate1 Latin verb-forming suffix that means to make, cause, do
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The suffix -ate primarily forms transitive verbs from Latin bases. Many -ate verbs were loanwords from Latin. Verbs ending in -ate combine with the suffix -ion to form nouns ending in -ation. These verbs also have corresponding agent nouns ending in -ator (navigator, dictator, elevator).