Meaning

(transitive) To find fault with, blame, censure..

Definitions by Sense

1. (transitive) To find fault with, blame, censure.
2. (transitive, law, followed by "of") To charge with having committed a crime or offence.
3. (intransitive) To make an accusation against someone.
4. (obsolete) Accusation.

Example Sentences

[…] and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another.

We are accused of having persuaded Austria and Sardinia to lay down their arms when their differences might have involved the Powers of Europe in contention.

For the U.S. President to be impeached, he must be accused of a high crime or misdemeanor.

Neither can they prove the things whereof they now accuse me.

Ting Ling had disappeared from public life in 1958. She was accused of being a "Rightist" and was sent to a farm in Hei-lung-chiang Province in remote northeast China, worked there twelve years raising chickens, was in prison five years (1970-1975), and began to live in a village in Shansi in 1975.

According to this saga of intellectual-property misanthropy, these creatures [patent trolls] roam the business world, buying up patents and then using them to demand extravagant payouts from companies they accuse of infringing them. Often, their victims pay up rather than face the costs of a legal battle.

And dogged York, that reaches at the moon, / Whose overweening arm I have plucked back, / By false accuse doth level at my life.

Word Forms

• accuses
• accusing
• accused
• no-table-tags
• glossary
• accuse
• accusest
• accusedst
• accuseth
• -

Synonyms for accuse

Related Words

When Should You Use Accuse?

Use accuse when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

Practice This Word

Frequently Asked Questions