Vilipend

Word of the Day for Wednesday, February 15, 2012

vilipend \vil-UH-pend\, verb:

1. To regard or treat as of little value or account.
2. To vilify; depreciate.

She will seize her opportunity to vilipend me, and I shall be condemned by the kind of court-martial which hurries over the forms of a trial to sign the execution-warrant that makes it feel like justice.
-- George Meredith, The Tragic Comedian

This endeavoured to fit the same mould as Pragmaticus and Melancholicus, but was too pedantic and dull, despite Wharton's use of it to vilipend the parliamentarian astrologer William Lilly.
-- Joad Raymond, The Invention of the Newspaper

Vilipend is derived from the Old French roots vīli meaning vile and pendere meaning to consider, also the root of pensive.

Thanks to: http://www.dictionary.com/