different between backslider vs recreant

English

Etymology

From backslide +? -er.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?baksla?d?/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?bæksla?d??/

Noun

backslider (plural backsliders)

1. A recidivist; one who backslides, especially in a religious sense; an apostate.
   • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, ‘The Judgement of Dungara’, Black and White, Folio Society 2004, vol. 1, p. 382:

     At night the Red Elephant Tusk boomed and groaned among the hills, and the faithful waked and said: ‘The God of Things as They Are matures revenge against the backsliders.’

   • 2009, Andrew F. Cooper, "Confronting Vulnerability through Resilient Diplomacy: Antigua and the WTO Internet Gambling Dispute with the United States" in Andrew F. Cooper and Timothy M. Shaw (eds.), The Diplomacies of Small States: Between Vulnerability and Resilience, Palgrave Macmillan, p. 216,

     The choice of unilateralism by the US also exposed it to charges that it is a backslider on its WTO commitments.

   • 2012, Brian Bethune, "Two against one: About coupledom and the stigma of being single" in Maclean's, 20 June, 2012, [1]

     You say that you “lapse into coupledom” on occasion. Do you get grief from fellow militant singles for being a backslider?

   She married him thinking to change his ways, and for a while he got religion, but he was ever a backslider; she soon began finding bottles stashed about the house.

Anagrams

• blackrides

English

Etymology

From Anglo-Norman recreant, Middle French recreant (“defeated”), from recroire (“to yield in a trial by combat, surrender allegiance”). See recray; and compare miscreant.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /???k???nt/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /???k?i?nt/

Adjective

recreant (comparative more recreant, superlative most recreant)

1. (now rare, poetic) Having admitted defeat and surrendered; defeated. [from 13th c.]
2. (now poetic, literary) Unfaithful to someone, or to one's duties or honour; disloyal, false. [from 17th c.]

Derived terms

• recreance
• recreancy
• recreantly

Noun

recreant (plural recreants)

1. Somebody who is recreant, who yields in combat; a coward or traitor.

Synonyms

Anagrams

• Terrance, canterer, recanter

Catalan

Verb

recreant

1. present participle of recrear

Dutch

Etymology

From Latin recreans, present participle of recre? (“I refresh; I invigorate”). Equivalent to recreëren +? -ant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?re?.kre???nt/
• Hyphenation: re?cre?ant
• Rhymes: -?nt

Noun

recreant m (plural recreanten, diminutive recreantje n)

1. someone who practices or enjoys recreation

References

• H. H. Mallinckrodt, Latijn Nederlands woordenboek (Aula n° 24), Utrecht-Antwerpen, Spectrum, 1959 [Latin - Dutch dictionary in Dutch]

Anagrams

• traceren

Latin

Verb

recreant

1. third-person plural present active indicative of recre?

Old French

Adjective

recreant m (oblique and nominative feminine singular recreant or recreante)

1. recreant; defeated

Descendants

• ? English: recreant

References

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (recreant)
• recreant on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub