Ravish

ravish



Y

D



–verb (used with object) 

1. to fill with 

strong emotion, 

esp. joy.  



2. to seize and carry off 

by force.  



3. to carry off (a woman) by force. 

4. to rape (a woman).  



—Synonyms 1. enrapture (使著迷), transport (使心醉), enthrall (吸引住), delight, captivate.





C



ravage, ravish (vv.), ravishing (adj.) 

   

Ravage means "to ruin, destroy, plunder, or devastate": The marauders (掠奪者) ravaged the [village]. 



Ravish has three related meanings: 





1. "to rape (literally or figuratively)" 



The [soldiers] killed the few men there and brutally ravished the [women].



2. "to capture and carry off violently" 



The [storehouse] door had been [broken], and all the supplies had been ravished [away].



3. and, by extension, "to overcome emotionally, to enrapture, to transport [with] delight” 



Their playing of the double concerto simply ravished the [audience]. 





This use of the verb, like most uses of the adjective ravishing, is figurative and hyperbolic: She looked [stunning], absolutely [ravishing], when she made her entrance.   



Only in the sense "to seize or rob and carry off" are ravage and ravish synonymous, even though they both come from the Old French verb ravir, meaning "to carry away," and ultimately from the Latin rapere, from which we get English rape as well. 



Best advice to avoid confusion: limit ravage to destroying and devastating, and separately specify when things are carried off as well. Or use ravish to cover both ideas. 





　

Consider. Don Lope, 



a feisty middle-aged intellectual and atheist, 



sees his chance when the beautiful young Tristana (Catherine Deneuve) is orphaned. As the girl's guardian, he takes her into his household and (in what seems like no time at all) into his bed. 



While ravishing [her], 



he excuses himself by rationalizing that she'd [fare] worse on the streets.





heist rifle pillage caper

arson 

cf. arsenal



felony felon venue injunction

loitering 

larceny kleptomania purloin filch (small value)

mayhem sabotage



plunder 

to plunder a [town]. 

to plunder the [public treasury].  

Sham