COMMISERATE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does commiserate mean? 

• COMMISERATE (verb)
  The verb COMMISERATE has 1 sense:

1. to feel or express sympathy or compassion

  Familiarity information: COMMISERATE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• COMMISERATE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they commiserate    ... he / she / it commiserates   
Past simple: commiserated   
Past participle: commiserated   
-ing form: commiserating   

Sense 1

Meaning:

To feel or express sympathy or compassion

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

commiserate; sympathise; sympathize

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

compassionate; condole with; feel for; pity; sympathize with (share the suffering of)

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

condole (express one's sympathetic grief, on the occasion of someone's death)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Sentence example:

Sam and Sue commiserate

Derivation:

commiseration (an expression of sympathy with another's grief)

commiseration (a feeling of sympathy and sorrow for the misfortunes of others)

commiserative (feeling or expressing sympathy)

 Context examples 

Listen to my tale; when you have heard that, abandon or commiserate me, as you shall judge that I deserve.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

“I could see that you were commiserating me over my weakness,” said Holmes, laughing.

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

As soon as breakfast was over, she sat down to fulfil her promise to Miss Tilney, whose trust in the effect of time and distance on her friend's disposition was already justified, for already did Catherine reproach herself with having parted from Eleanor coldly, with having never enough valued her merits or kindness, and never enough commiserated her for what she had been yesterday left to endure.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

She remained there at least an hour, in the greatest agitation, deeply commiserating the state of her poor friend, and expecting a summons herself from the angry general to attend him in his own apartment.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)