Impute

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ɪmˈpjuːt/
• Rhymes: -uːt

Origin

From Old French imputer, from Latin imputare ("to bring into the reckoning, charge, impute").

Full definition of impute

Verb

1. (transitive) To reckon as pertaining or attributable; to charge; to ascribe; to attribute; to set to the account of; to charge to one as the author, responsible originator, or possessor; -- generally in a bad sense.
• 1751, Thomas Gray, , lines 37–40:Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault, // If mem’ry o’er their tomb no trophies raise, // Where thro’ the long-drawn isle and fretted vault, // The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
• 1856 February, Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay, “Oliver Goldsmith” in the Encyclopædia Britannica (eighth edition), volume and page numbers unknown:He was vain, sensual, frivolous, profuse, improvident. One vice of a darker shade was imputed to him, envy.
• 1956–1960, Richard Stanley Peters, The Concept of Motivation, (second edition, 1960), chapter ii: “Motives and Motivation”, page 29:We ascribe or impute motives to others and avow them or confess to them in ourselves.
2. (transitive, theology) To ascribe (sin or righteousness) to someone by substitution.
• 2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity, Penguin (2010), page 607:To use the technical language of theologians, God through his grace ‘imputes’ the merits of the crucified and risen Christ to a fallen human being who remains without inherent merit, and who without this ‘imputation’ would not be ‘made’ righteous at all.
3. (transitive) To take account of; to consider; to regard.
• 1788, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire VI, chapter lxiv, “A.D. 1355–1391: The Emperor John Palæologus; Discord of the Greeks”, page 328:They Å¿erved with honour in the wars of Bajazet; but a plan of fortifying ConÅ¿tantinople excited his jealouÅ¿y: he threatened their lives; the new works were inÅ¿tantly demoliÅ¿hed; and we Å¿hall beÅ¿tow a praiÅ¿e, perhaps above the merit of Palæologus, if we impute this laÅ¿t humiliation as the cauÅ¿e of his death.
4. (transitive) To attribute or credit to.We imputed this quotation to Shakespeare.People impute great cleverness to cats.
5. (transitive) To attribute (responsibility or fault) to a cause or source.The teacher imputed the student's failure to his nervousness.

Synonyms

• ascribe, assign, attribute, charge, reckon, consider, imply, insinuate

Related terms

• imputability
• imputable
• imputableness
• imputably
• imputation
• imputed

Anagrams

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