oppugn
verb/əˈpjuːn/
Etymology From Middle French oppugner Latin oppugno (“fight against, to attack, assail, assault, storm, besiege, war with”).
1
Rare To contradict or controvert; to oppose; to challenge or question the truth or validity of a given statement.
- If nothing can oppugne love, And virtue invious ways can prove, What may not he confide to do That brings both love and virtue too?1662 (indicated as 1663), [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, 1905, →OCLC:
- It is for the same reason, that is, because 'tis all comprehended in Slawkenbergius, that I say nothing likewise of Scroderus (Andrea) who all the world knows, set himself to oppugn Prignitz with great violence, ---- proving it in his own way, first logically, and then by a series of stubborn facts1761, Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, volume III, London: R. and J. Dodsley, page 180:
- Derived terms
- oppugnable, oppugnancy, oppugnant, oppugner, unoppugned
- Related terms
- impugn, pugnacious, repugnant