defy
verbWord Family
- defy verb
- defiance noun
- defiant adjective
Verb Forms
Idioms | present simple I / you / we / they defy | |
| he / she / it defies | |
| past simple defied | |
| past participle defied | |
| -ing form defying |
- defy somebody/something
to refuse to obey or show respect for somebody in authority, a law, a rule, etc. 违抗；反抗；蔑视 I wouldn't have dared to defy my teachers. 我可不敢不听老师的话。 Hundreds of people today defied the ban on political gatherings. 今天有数百人违抗禁止政治集会的规定。
Extra ExamplesTopics Permission and obligationc1He is willing to defy his own party. 他自愿违抗自己的党派。 Journalists were openly defying the authorities. 新闻记者公然藐视当局。 The protesters continued to defy a court injunction. 抗议者继续藐视法庭的一项禁制令。
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadverb- openly
- be prepared to
- be willing to
- continue to
- …
- defy belief, explanation, description, etc.
to be impossible or almost impossible to believe, explain, describe, etc. 不可能，无法（相信、解释、描绘等） a political move that defies explanation 无法解释的政治举动 The beauty of the scene defies description. 景色之美简直难以描绘。 His face was so odd that it defies description. 他的脸长得特别古怪，简直无法描述。
- defy something
to successfully resist something to a very unusual degree 经受住；顶住；抗住 The baby boy defied all the odds and survived (= stayed alive when it seemed certain that he would die). 这名男婴九死一生活了下来。
Word OriginMiddle English (in the senses ‘renounce an allegiance’ and ‘challenge to combat’): from Old French desfier, based on Latin dis- (expressing reversal) + fidus ‘faithful’.