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Demean   /dɪmˈin/   Listen
verb
Demean  v. t.  (past & past part. demeaned; pres. part. demeaning)  
1.
To manage; to conduct; to treat. "(Our) clergy have with violence demeaned the matter."
2.
To conduct; to behave; to comport; followed by the reflexive pronoun. "They have demeaned themselves Like men born to renown by life or death." "They answered... that they should demean themselves according to their instructions."
3.
To debase; to lower; to degrade; followed by the reflexive pronoun. "Her son would demean himself by a marriage with an artist's daughter." Note: This sense is probably due to a false etymology which regarded the word as connected with the adjective mean.


noun
Demean  n.  
1.
Management; treatment. (Obs.) "Vile demean and usage bad."
2.
Behavior; conduct; bearing; demeanor. (Obs.) "With grave demean and solemn vanity."


Demean  n.  
1.
Demesne. (Obs.)
2.
pl. Resources; means. (Obs.) "You know How narrow our demeans are."





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Demean" Quotes from Famous Books



... Venice. But Venice in 1466, a rich, proud, and prosperous city, was a very poor place for a lad who had neither friends nor money; for, of course, the royal prince of a little island in the Mediterranean could not so demean himself as to soil his hands ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... was his first private interview with a professional sea-robber, and he did not know exactly how to demean himself; but as his visitor's manner was quiet, and as he came on board alone, it was not to be supposed ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... not, sir!" and she struggled still more fiercely. "Do not deceive yourself! Me you cannot deceive! Let me go, I say! You could not demean yourself to love a ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... Lyon," exclaimed Mrs. Jones, with ill-concealed indignation. "No, indeed, that I will not. Do you think I would demean myself so much?" ...
— Off-Hand Sketches - a Little Dashed with Humor • T. S. Arthur
... necessary for the meal; Susan looking, as she put the kettle on the fire and glanced at her sister, as if divided between the agreeable triumph of shewing her activity and usefulness, and the dread of being thought to demean herself by such an office. "She had been into the kitchen," she said, "to hurry Sally and help make the toast, and spread the bread and butter, or she did not know when they should have got tea, and she was sure her sister must want ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen


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