mistake
//mɪˈstʊk//
Forms
- present (v1)
- mistake
- past (v2)
- mistook
- past participle (v3)
- mistaken
- present participle
- mistaking
- 3rd person singular
- mistakes
- Plural
- mistakes
Definitions
1.To understand wrongly, taking one thing or person for another.
- Don't mistake my kindness for weakness.
- Sorry, I mistook you for my brother. You look very similar.
- The reigning error of his life was, that he mistook the love for the practice of virtue, and was indeed not so much a good man, as the friend of goodness.
1.An error.
- He always did mistakes on purpose.
- There were too many mistakes in the test, that unfortunately you failed.
2.A pitch which was intended to be pitched in a hard-to-hit location, but instead ends up in an easy-to-hit place.
Frequency
Overall
Common· #1283
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Common
- General reading & writing
- Common
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Related words
Word family
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).