CHASTEN

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does chasten mean? 

• CHASTEN (verb)
  The verb CHASTEN has 3 senses:

1. censure severely

2. change by restraining or moderating

3. correct by punishment or discipline

  Familiarity information: CHASTEN used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CHASTEN (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they chasten    ... he / she / it chastens   
Past simple: chastened   
Past participle: chastened   
-ing form: chastening   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Censure severely

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

castigate; chasten; chastise; correct; objurgate

Context example:

She chastised him for his insensitive remarks

Hypernyms (to "chasten" is one way to...):

bawl out; berate; call down; call on the carpet; chew out; chew up; chide; dress down; have words; jaw; lambast; lambaste; lecture; rag; rebuke; remonstrate; reprimand; scold; take to task; trounce (censure severely or angrily)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "chasten"):

flame (criticize harshly, usually via an electronic medium)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Sense 2

Meaning:

Change by restraining or moderating

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

chasten; temper

Hypernyms (to "chasten" is one way to...):

alter; change; modify (cause to change; make different; cause a transformation)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Sense 3

Meaning:

Correct by punishment or discipline

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

chasten; subdue; tame

Hypernyms (to "chasten" is one way to...):

alter; change; modify (cause to change; make different; cause a transformation)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s somebody
Something ----s somebody

 Context examples 

His wild and enthusiastic imagination was chastened by the sensibility of his heart.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

His spirit must be chastened, as must that of many more in this Abbey.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Even in his chastened frame of mind, the noble miser could give us no information which could help us, for he knew little of the private life of his nephew.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

As I look out on the night, my tears fall fast, and my undisciplined heart is chastened heavily—heavily.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Our eyes have seen great wonders and our souls are chastened by what we have endured.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Sacred moments, when heart talked to heart in the silence of the night, turning affliction to a blessing, which chastened grief and strengthened love.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

The stiff-rim and the square-cut vanished, being replaced by milder garments; the toughness went out of the face, the hardness out of the eyes; and, the face, chastened and refined, was irradiated from an inner life of communion with beauty and knowledge.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Miss Temple had always something of serenity in her air, of state in her mien, of refined propriety in her language, which precluded deviation into the ardent, the excited, the eager: something which chastened the pleasure of those who looked on her and listened to her, by a controlling sense of awe; and such was my feeling now: but as to Helen Burns, I was struck with wonder.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

We have not, it is true, ascended the plateau, but it lies before us, and even Professor Summerlee is in a more chastened mood.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The sun lay low in the west upon a purple cloud, whence it threw a mild, chastening light over the wild moorland and glittered on the fringe of forest turning the withered leaves into flakes of dead gold, the brighter for the black depths behind them.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)