dispel

From Middle English dispelen, from Latin dispellere (“to disperse; to dispel”).

• IPA^(key): [dɪˈspɛɫ]

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: di‧spel
• Rhymes: -ɛl

dispel (third-person singular simple present dispels, present participle dispelling, simple past and past participle dispelled)

1. (transitive) To drive away or cause to vanish by scattering.

   Synonym: disperse

   The clouds and mist were soon enough dispelled by the sun.

2. (transitive) To remove (fears, doubts, objections etc.) by proving them unjustified.
   • 1906, Stanley J[ohn] Weyman, chapter I, in Chippinge Borough, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips & Co., →OCLC, page 01:

     It was April 22, 1831, and a young man was walking down Whitehall in the direction of Parliament Street. […]. He halted opposite the Privy Gardens, and, with his face turned skywards, listened until the sound of the Tower guns smote again on the ear and dispelled his doubts.

   • 1957 January, H. A. Vallance, “The Deeside Railway—1”, in Railway Magazine, page 6:

     The fate of the railway from Ballater to Braemar has been invested with an air of mystery, which has never been completely dispelled. It has been suggested that Queen Victoria was opposed to a railway in the vicinity of Balmoral Castle, and intervened personally to secure the abandonment of the line beyond Ballater.

• dispel a cloud
• dispel rumours
• dispel cares
• dispel doubts
• dispel illusions
• dispel objections
• dispel vapors

dispel (plural dispels)

1. An act or instance of dispelling.
   • 2008, Caitlin Kittredge, Night Life‎^[1]:

     “My dispel didn't work,” she said finally. “He wasn't a blood witch, Sunny,” I said.

• dispulsion

• spiled, diples, lisped, Spidle, disple, lipsed, pleids, Spilde