call to account

verb

To challenge or contest; to hold answerable for something.

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Meanings

verbcall to account (third-person singular simple present calls to account, present participle calling to account, simple past and past participle called to account)

present singular third person calls to account · participle present calling to account · participle past called to account · past called to account

  1. idiomaticTo challenge or contest; to hold answerable for something.

    "But, Doctor, aren't we to do anything to discover the culprits? A harmless dog is killed, an inoffensive man's reason, if not his life, endangered. Surely someone ought to be called to account—"

    1934, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], The Bravo of London
    1 more example

    TravelWatch SouthWest Chairman Chris Irwin said: "This is intolerable. The South West deserves levelling up, not running down. SWR and its sponsors in the Department of Transport must be called to account."

    2022 January 26, Paul Clifton, “"Intolerable" service cuts under emergency COVID timetables”, in RAIL, number 949, page 8

Synonyms & antonyms

Also see
hold to account
Cite this entry
APA

call to account. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/call%20to%20account

MLA

“call to account.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/call%20to%20account. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “call to account,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/call%20to%20account.

Source: call to account on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.