vindicate

What it means

1. transitiveTo clear of an accusation, suspicion or criticism.

   to vindicate someone's honor

   1 more example

   As a man of vision, he understood this. Without Cerberus, humanity was doomed to an existence of groveling subservience at the feet of alien masters. Still, there were those who would call what he did criminal. Unethical. Amoral. History would vindicate him, but until it did he and his followers were forced to exist in hiding, working toward their goals in secret.

   2008, Drew Karpyshyn, Mass Effect: Ascension, Del Rey Books, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 3

   Synonyms: absolve, clear, exonerate, acquittance, assoil, assoilzie, acquit, absolve

2. transitiveTo justify by providing evidence.

   to vindicate a right, claim or title

   3 more examples

   The Ukrainians immediately demanded a goal and their claims were vindicated as replays showed the ball crossed the line before Terry's intervention.

   2012 June 19, Phil McNulty, “England 1-0 Ukraine”, in BBC Sport

   Also see: United National Congress, Trinidad and Tobago

   Kamla Persad Bissessar: " We have been vindicated, but it is a victory for the people"

3. transitiveTo maintain or defend (a cause) against opposition.

   to vindicate the rights of labor movement in developing countries

   1 more example

   When Trump's election pulled back the curtain on the rise of the far-right in America, I'd naively assumed the Jewish left would be vindicated.

   2019, Eli Valley, “A Springtime of Erasure”, in Jewish Currents, number Fall 2019, page 14

In a sentence

to vindicate someone's honor

Where it comes from

1. Latinvindicātus
2. Englishvindicate

Borrowed from Latin vindicātus, perfect passive participle of vindicō (“lay legal claim to something; set free; protect, avenge, punish”), from vim, accusative singular of vīs (“force, power”), + dīcō (“say; declare, state”). See avenge.