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PROVOKED
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I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Incited, especially deliberately, to anger
Example:
the provoked animal attacked the child
Synonyms:
aggravated; provoked
Classified under:
Similar:
angry (feeling or showing anger)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
Past simple / past participle of the verb provoke
Context examples:
They found that when used against a single competitor, provocation backfires: the provoked strain mounts a strong toxic counterattack and harms the provoking strain.
(Bacteria Can 'Divide and Conquer' to Vanquish Their Enemies, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)
Emma saw Mrs. Weston's surprize, and felt that it must be great, at an address which, in words and manner, was assuming to himself the right of first interest in her; and as for herself, she was too much provoked and offended to have the power of directly saying any thing to the purpose.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
Mr. Dick was so very complacent, sitting on the foot of the bed, nursing his leg, and telling me this, with his eyes wide open and a surprised smile, that I am sorry to say I was provoked into explaining to him that ruin meant distress, want, and starvation; but I was soon bitterly reproved for this harshness, by seeing his face turn pale, and tears course down his lengthened cheeks, while he fixed upon me a look of such unutterable woe, that it might have softened a far harder heart than mine.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I am not in the least provoked at the sight of a lawyer, a pickpocket, a colonel, a fool, a lord, a gamester, a politician, a whoremonger, a physician, an evidence, a suborner, an attorney, a traitor, or the like; this is all according to the due course of things: but when I behold a lump of deformity and diseases, both in body and mind, smitten with pride, it immediately breaks all the measures of my patience; neither shall I be ever able to comprehend how such an animal, and such a vice, could tally together.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
Why he had done it, what could have provoked him to such a breach of hospitality, and so suddenly turned all his partial regard for their daughter into actual ill will, was a matter which they were at least as far from divining as Catherine herself; but it did not oppress them by any means so long; and, after a due course of useless conjecture, that it was a strange business, and that he must be a very strange man, grew enough for all their indignation and wonder; though Sarah indeed still indulged in the sweets of incomprehensibility, exclaiming and conjecturing with youthful ardour.
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
The poem’s interpretation as a prophecy of the end of the pagan gods and their replacement by the one, singular god, suggests that memories of this terrible volcanic eruption were purposefully provoked to stimulate the Christianisation of Iceland.
(Volcanic eruption influenced Iceland’s conversion to Christianity, University of Cambridge)
Mr. Wickham was so perfectly satisfied with this conversation that he never again distressed himself, or provoked his dear sister Elizabeth, by introducing the subject of it; and she was pleased to find that she had said enough to keep him quiet.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
I could not help being provoked; for after all my pains, and when I had really made a very good likeness of it—(Mrs. Weston and I were quite agreed in thinking it very like)—only too handsome—too flattering—but that was a fault on the right side—after all this, came poor dear Isabella's cold approbation of—Yes, it was a little like—but to be sure it did not do him justice.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
She was already greatly displeased with Mrs. Ferrars; and such ill-timed praise of another, at Elinor's expense, though she had not any notion of what was principally meant by it, provoked her immediately to say with warmth, This is admiration of a very particular kind! —what is Miss Morton to us? —who knows, or who cares, for her? —it is Elinor of whom WE think and speak.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
Her greatest wonder on the subject soon became—not that Susan should have been provoked into disrespect and impatience against her better knowledge—but that so much better knowledge, so many good notions should have been hers at all; and that, brought up in the midst of negligence and error, she should have formed such proper opinions of what ought to be; she, who had had no cousin Edmund to direct her thoughts or fix her principles.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
