Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • transitive verb To soil, stain, or dirty with or as if with a smearing agent.
  • transitive verb To dishonor; defame.
  • noun Something, such as a blot, smear, or stain, that smirches.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To stain; smear; soil; smutch; besmirch.
  • Figuratively, to degrade; reduce in honor, dignity, fame, repute, or the like: as, to smirch one's own or another's reputation.
  • noun A soiling mark or smear; a darkening stain; a smutch.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To smear with something which stains, or makes dirty; to smutch; to begrime; to soil; to sully.
  • noun A smutch; a dirty stain.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To dirty; to make dirty.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb smear so as to make dirty or stained
  • noun a blemish made by dirt
  • verb charge falsely or with malicious intent; attack the good name and reputation of someone
  • noun an act that brings discredit to the person who does it

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English smorchen.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Attested since the 15th Century CE; possibly from Old French esmorcher ("to torture"), from Latin morsus ("bitten").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word smirch.

Examples

  • She had wandered away amid the complexities and smirch and withering heats of the great world, and she had returned, simple, and clean, and wholesome.

    CHAPTER 2 2010

  • Martin, she seemed to see the smirch left upon him by his surroundings.

    Chapter 26 2010

  • Every hand but his was black with soot, and his was guiltless of the smirch of Hooniah's pot.

    THE MASTER OF MYSTERY 2010

  • Lewis puts this very well, Eugenics have made certain that only demi-gods will now be born: psycho-analysis that none of them shall lose or smirch his divinity: economics that they shall have to hand all that demi-gods require.

    C.S. Lewis on Evolutionism (the Myth) 2009

  • He was soldierly, flip, and intense about the defense of his honor, even when the smirch was well deserved or the fault his own.

    CHASING the WHITE DOG MAX WATMAN 2010

  • He was soldierly, flip, and intense about the defense of his honor, even when the smirch was well deserved or the fault his own.

    CHASING the WHITE DOG MAX WATMAN 2010

  • He was soldierly, flip, and intense about the defense of his honor, even when the smirch was well deserved or the fault his own.

    CHASING the WHITE DOG MAX WATMAN 2010

  • He came out of the Keating Five scandal (remember?) with nary a smirch while felony convictions were falling like rain.

    McCain In New Hampshire Paper: Without More Troops, We Won't Win 2009

  • I wouldn't be smirch anyone for living were they want to live thoufh - people just go down different paths is all.

    Palin: The "Best Of America," The "Real America," Is In Small Towns 2009

  • What a smirch on the record of Kansas University by Paula Sayles on Thursday, May 7, 2009 at 3: 14: 59 PM

    Military-backed Mapping Project in Oaxaca Under Fire 2009

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • As You Like It 1.3.105-106:

    I'll put myself in poor and mean attire,

    And with a kind of umber smirch my face.

    The like do you, so shall we pass along,

    And never stir assailants.

    December 17, 2008