Dictionary

beplague en · VERB

Pronunciation

• /bɪˈpleɪɡ/

Etymology

From be- + plague. First attested in 1734 (see quotations).

Meanings

1. (archaic, transitive) To plague.
   • True, my father was buried at sea, but only because he was a soldier of the 45th Highlanders who went overseas to St Lucia in the 1793 expedition and there died of one of those bloody fluxes that so beplague men unused to the climate of the West Indies. 1950 [1949], Stanley D. Porteus, chapter I, in The Restless Voyage, London; Sydney: George G. Harrap & Co.; The Australian Publishing Co., page 11:
   • “ If not, I aſk what other evil “ Can ſo beplague us but the devil? 1790, Thomas Rodd, The Theriad, London: […] W. Lowndes, page 14:
   • And there with laughter to beplague you, 'Till it has ſhaken off your ague. July 20, 1734 (date written), “To the Same”, in Part of the Poetical Works of the Late Rev. Samuel Shepherd, A. M., Dublin: […] W. Sleater, published 1790, page 56:
   • It has its inconveniences, being distant from that source of all comfort, the well, and beplagued with ants. 1858 February 14, Burton, “Zanzibar; and Two Months in East Africa”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume LXXXIII, number DVIII, Edinburgh, Chapter III.–Mombas, page 219, column 1:

Forms