demerit

From Old French desmerite (modern French démérite).

• IPA^(key): /dɪˈmɛɹɪt/

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• Rhymes: -ɛɹɪt

demerit (countable and uncountable, plural demerits)

1. A quality of being inadequate; a disadvantage, a fault.
   • 1672, William Temple, “An Essay upon the Original and Nature of Government. […]”, in Miscellanea. The First Part. [...], 3rd edition, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], and Awnsham and John Churchill, […], published 1691, →OCLC, page 70:

     [W]hatever they acquire by their Induſtry or Ingenuity […] ſhould be as much their Property, as any diviſions of Land or of Stock that are made to the Sons; and the Poſſeſſion as ſecure, unleſs forfeited by any demerit or offence againſt the cuſtoms of the Family, which grow with time to be the Orders of this little State.

   • 1790 November, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, and on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event. […], London: […] J[ames] Dodsley, […], →OCLC:

     They see no merit or demerit in any man or any action.

2. A mark given for bad conduct to a person attending an educational institution or serving in the army.
   • 2002, George W. Bush, Commencement Address at West Point:

     A few of you have followed in the path of the perfect West Point graduate, Robert E. Lee, who never received a single demerit in four years. Some of you followed in the path of the imperfect graduate, Ulysses S. Grant, who had his fair share of demerits, and said the happiest day of his life was "the day I left West Point." (Laughter.)

3. That which one merits or deserves, either of good or ill; desert.
   • c. 1610 (first performance), attributed to John Marston, and/or William Barkstead and Lewis Machin, The Insatiate Countesse. A Tragedie: […], London: […] T[homas] S[nodham] for Thomas Archer, […], published 1613, →OCLC, Act V, signature I2, recto:

     I fall to riſe, mount to thy maker, ſpirit, /. Leaue here thy body, death ha's her demerit.

   • 1603, Plutarch, “What Signifieth this Word Ei, Engraven over the Dore of Apolloes Temple in the City of Delphi”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Philosophie, Commonlie Called, The Morals […], London: […] Arnold Hatfield, →OCLC, page 1354:

     But when firſt Cleobulus the tyrant of the Lindians, and then Periander the tyrant likewiſe of Corinth (who had neither of them any one jot of vertue or wiſdome) by the greatneſſe of their power, by the number of their friends, and by many benefits and demerits whereby they obliged their adherents, acquired forcibly this reputation, in deſpite of all uſurped the name of Sages; and to this purpoſe cauſed to be ſpred ſowen and divulged throughout all Greece certaine odde ſentences and notable ſayings, as well as thoſe of others, wherewith the former Sages, above named were diſcontented.

• discredit

• merit

• demerit good
• demerit point

demerit (third-person singular simple present demerits, present participle demeriting, simple past and past participle demerited)

1. (transitive, archaic) To deserve.
   • 1840, Alexander Campbell, Dolphus Skinner, A discussion of the doctrines of the endless misery and universal salvation, page 351:

     You hold that every sin is an infinite evil, demeriting endless punishment.

2. (transitive, archaic) To depreciate or cry down.
   • 1576, John Woolton, The Christian Manuell:

     Faith by her own dignity and worthiness doth not demerit justice and righteousness; but receiveth and embraceth the same offered unto us in the gospel […]

• detemir, dimeter, merited, mitered, red time, retimed

Borrowed from French démérite.

demerit n (plural demerite)

1. (obsolete) lack of merit

• demerit in Academia Română, Micul dicționar academic, ediția a II-a, Bucharest: Univers Enciclopedic, 2010. →ISBN