Library / English Dictionary

MISLEAD

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected form: misled   

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Give false or misleading information to

Synonyms:

misinform; mislead

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "mislead" is one way to...):

inform (impart knowledge of some fact, state of affairs, or event to)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "mislead"):

lie (tell an untruth; pretend with intent to deceive)

beat around the bush; equivocate; palter; prevaricate; tergiversate (be deliberately ambiguous or unclear in order to mislead or withhold information)

amplify; exaggerate; hyperbolise; hyperbolize; magnify; overdraw; overstate (to enlarge beyond bounds or the truth)

sandbag (downplay one's ability (towards others) in a game in order to deceive, as in gambling)

betray; deceive; lead astray (cause someone to believe an untruth)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s somebody
Something ----s somebody

Derivation:

misleader (someone who leads astray (often deliberately))

Sense 2

Meaning:

Lead someone in the wrong direction or give someone wrong directions

Example:

The pedestrian misdirected the out-of-town driver

Synonyms:

lead astray; misdirect; misguide; mislead

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Hypernyms (to "mislead" is one way to...):

conduct; direct; guide; lead; take (take somebody somewhere)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

misleader (someone who leads astray (often deliberately))

Credits

 Context examples: 

But critics of the research implied the findings were misleading, and urged parents not to worry about whether their child's brain is 'damaged'.

(Too Much Screen Time Changes Structure of Toddlers' Brains, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The god Ea manipulates language and misleads people into doing his will because it serves his self-interest.

(‘Trickster god’ used fake news in Babylonian Noah story, University of Cambridge)

I do not know that her uncle has any claim to her gratitude; his wife certainly had; and it is the warmth of her respect for her aunt's memory which misleads her here.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

She found that she had been misled by the careful, the considerate attention of her daughter, to think the attachment, which once she had so well understood, much slighter in reality, than she had been wont to believe, or than it was now proved to be.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

“If it please you, fair lord,” said Black Simon, “this man hath misled us, and since there is no tree upon which we may hang him, it might be well to hurl him over yonder cliff.”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

For having strictly examined all the persons of greatest name in the courts of princes, for a hundred years past, I found how the world had been misled by prostitute writers, to ascribe the greatest exploits in war, to cowards; the wisest counsel, to fools; sincerity, to flatterers; Roman virtue, to betrayers of their country; piety, to atheists; chastity, to sodomites; truth, to informers: how many innocent and excellent persons had been condemned to death or banishment by the practising of great ministers upon the corruption of judges, and the malice of factions: how many villains had been exalted to the highest places of trust, power, dignity, and profit: how great a share in the motions and events of courts, councils, and senates might be challenged by bawds, whores, pimps, parasites, and buffoons.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

If this goes on it may ultimately mislead us.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

If it be so, if I have been misled by such error to inflict pain on her, your resentment has not been unreasonable.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Mr. Micawber may have occasionally given a bill without consulting me, or he may have misled me as to the period when that obligation would become due.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

He will not be led astray; he will not be misled by others to his ruin.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)