| conjure | to summon”I conjure you by that which you profess – howe’er you come to know it – answer me.” [Macbeth] |
| profess | to admit, recognize”I conjure you by that which you profess – howe’er you come to know it – answer me.” [Macbeth] |
| apparition | ghost, vision(3 separate apparitions appear while Macbeth is with the witches) |
| potent | powerful, compelling”Here’s another [apparition] more potent than the first.” [First witch] |
| chafe | to irritate, annoy”Be lion-mettled, proud, and take no care who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are.” [Third Apparition] |
| resolute | unwavering, determined”Be bloody, bold, and resolute.” [Second Apparition] |
| vanquish | to conquer”Macbeth shall never vanquished be until Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane Hill shall come against him.” [Third Apparition] |
| antics | foolish, frivolous, or amusing behavior”I’ll charm the air to give a sound, while you perform your antic round.” [First Witch] |
| pernicious | destructive, malicious”Let this pernicious hour stand aye accursed in the calendar!” [Macbeth] |
| exploit | a feat, noble deed”Time, thou anticipat’st my dread exploits.” [Macbeth] |
| diminutive | very small”The most diminutive of birds, will fight, her young ones in her nest, against the owl.” [Lady Macduff] |
| judicious | cautious, sensible, wise”But for your husband, he is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows the fits o’ th’ season.” [Ross] |
| laudable | admirable, praiseworthy”But I remember now, I am in this earthly world, where to do harm is often laudable, to do good sometimes accounted dangerous folly.” [Lady Macduff] |
| unsanctified | unholy”I hope [Macduff is] in no place so unsanctified where such as thou mayst find him.” [Lady Macduff] |
| appease | to satisfy, allay”You may deserve of him through me, and wisdom to offer up a weak poor innocent lamb to appease an angry god.” [Malcolm] |
| recoil | to shrink back in horror”A good and virtuous nature may recoil in an imperial charge.” [Malcolm] |
| avaricious | greedy, materialistic”I grant him bloody, luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin that has a name: but there’s no bottom, none, in my voluptuousness…” [Malcolm] |
| voluptuousness | sensuousness, luxuriousness, sensuality”I grant him bloody, luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin that has a name: but there’s no bottom, none, in my voluptuousness…” [Malcolm] |
| intemperance | gluttony, overindulgence, lack of moderation”Boundless intemperance in nature is a tyranny; it hath been the untimely emptying of the happy throne and fall of many kings.” [Macduff] |
| abjure | to renounce, give up”I put myself to thy direction, and unspeak mine own detraction, here abjure the taints and blames I laid upon myself, for strangers to my nature.” [Malcolm] |
| malady | trouble, problem, disease”Ay, sir; there are a crew of wretched souls that stay his cure: their malady convinces the great assay of art.” [Doctor] |
| niggard/niggardly | covetous, stingy”But not a niggard of your speech: how goes’t?” [Macduff] |
| credulous | gullible”Devilish Macbeth by many of these trains hath sought to win me into his power, and modest wisdom plucks me from over-credulous haste.” [Malcolm] |
| bane | a person or thing that ruins or spoils; death; destruction; ruin |
| equivocation | a fallacy caused by the double meaning of a word; intentional ambiguity |
| antidote | a medicine or other remedy |
Macbeth Act IV Vocabulary
August 13, 2019