mistake
noun
- concept in law
- incorrect behavior
- something done incorrectly
verb
- confuse one thing for another
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /mɪˈsteɪk/ / [mɪˈsteɪk] / [mɪˈstɛjk]
noun
Etymology: From Middle English mistaken, from Old Norse mistaka (“to take in error, to miscarry”); equivalent to mis- + take. Cognate with Icelandic mistaka (“to mistake”), Swedish missta (“to mistake”) (before apocope misstaga). The noun, which replaced earlier mistaking, is derived from the verb. Compare Swedish misstag (“mistake”, noun), Faroese mistak (“mitake”, noun), Icelandic mistak (“mistake”, noun).
- An error.
“There were too many mistakes in the test, that unfortunately you failed.”
“He always did mistakes on purpose.”
- A pitch which was intended to be pitched in a hard-to-hit location, but instead ends up in an easy-to-hit place.
verb
Etymology: From Middle English mistaken, from Old Norse mistaka (“to take in error, to miscarry”); equivalent to mis- + take. Cognate with Icelandic mistaka (“to mistake”), Swedish missta (“to mistake”) (before apocope misstaga). The noun, which replaced earlier mistaking, is derived from the verb. Compare Swedish misstag (“mistake”, noun), Faroese mistak (“mitake”, noun), Icelandic mistak (“mistake”, noun).
- To understand wrongly, taking one thing or person for another.
“Sorry, I mistook you for my brother. You look very similar.”
“Don't mistake my kindness for weakness.”
- To misunderstand (someone).
“Miſtake me not, my Lord, ’tis not my meaning / To raze one Title of your Honour out.”
“[…] at last she so evidently demonstrated her Affection to him to be much stronger than what she bore her own Son, that it was impossible to mistake her any longer.”
- To commit an unintentional error; to do or think something wrong.
“Impoſe me to what penance your inuention / Can lay vpon my ſinne, yet ſinn’d I not / But in miſtaking.”
“1720, Jonathan Swift, “Letter to a Young Clergyman” in The Works of Jonathan Swift, London: Charles Elliot, 1784, Volume 10, pp. 6-7, No gentleman thinks it is safe or prudent to send a servant with a message, without repeating it more than once, and endeavouring to put it into terms brought down to the capacity of the bearer; yet, after all this care, it is frequent for servants to mistake, and sometimes occasion misunderstandings among friends […]”
- To take or choose wrongly.
“The better act of purposes mistook / Is to mistake again; though indirect, / Yet indirection thereby grows direct,”
“The Spear with erring Haste mistook its way, But plung’d in Eniopeus’ Bosom lay.”