revoke

UK/ɹɪˈvəʊk/US/ɹɪˈvoʊk/

verbB2+Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #9,469 of 15,258neutral

Other forms: revoked, revoking, revokes

To revoke is to officially cancel a licence, right or permission. Revoke a licence, revoked his visa, revoke the order.

It is done by the authority that granted the thing, which is what separates revoking from losing. It is used of licences, visas, wills and offers. In card games, to revoke is to fail to follow suit when you could, which carries a penalty. Note revocation; and that the Latin means to call back, from vocare.

Definitions of revoke

1verbrevokeTo officially cancel a licence, right or permission.B2+
“His driving licence was revoked after he was caught driving drunk.”

revoke is an official cancelling.

Also accepted in games: withdraw

Where it comes from

Latin revocare is re- plus vocare, to call. Vocation, invoke and voice come from the same calling, so revoking is calling something back.

Proto-Indo-European
*wekʷ-
Latin
revocare
Middle French
révoquer
English, today
revoke

Borrowed from Middle French révoquer, from Latin revocare, from re- + voco. a doublet of revocate.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Sharper Verbs

Practise this word

revoke in the wild

A revoke is usually a violation of one or more honor rules, and often comes to light after its commission, as trick-taking games play with hands concealed.
Revoke
An option contract is a type of contract that protects an offeree from an offeror's ability to revoke their offer to engage in a contract.
Option contract
The "coup" consists of a deliberate revoke by declarer, causing the next player to reveal whether he holds the key card whose location is sought.
Alcatraz coup
The person has the right to refuse to give consent, and except in limited cases may revoke consent at any point during the search.
Consent search
The decision to revoke 2Connect's licenses was reversed on 13 April 2011.
Ibrahim Sharif

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

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