defeat

将“defeat”分解为“de-”（表示“去”或“使…”）和“feet”（联想到“脚步”），想象成“去掉了敌人的脚步”，意味着击败对手或取得胜利。

defeat 战胜

de-, 不，非，使相反。feat, 功绩。引申义战胜。

defeat

defeat: [14] Etymologically, to defeat someone is literally to ‘undo’ them. The verb comes from Anglo–Norman defeter, a derivative of the noun defet. This in turn came from Old French desfait, the past participle of the verb desfaire. This was a descendant of medieval Latin disfacere, literally ‘undo’, a compound verb formed from the prefix dis-, denoting reversal, and Latin facere ‘do, make’.

Its original metaphorical extension was to ‘ruination’ or ‘destruction’, and the now central sense ‘conquer’ is not recorded in English before the 16th century. A classical Latin combination of facere with the prefix dē- rather than dis- produced defect, deficient, and deficit.
=> defect, deficient, deficit

defeat (v.)

late 14c., from Anglo-French defeter, from Old French desfait, past participle of desfaire "to undo," from Vulgar Latin *diffacere "undo, destroy," from Latin dis- "un-, not" (see dis-) + facere "to do, perform" (see factitious). Original sense was of "bring ruination, cause destruction." Military sense of "conquer" is c. 1600. Related: Defeated; defeating.

defeat (n.)

1590s, from defeat (v.).

1. After the pain of defeat passes, England have some thinking to do.

失败的痛苦过去以后，英国人应该认真反思一下。

2. Initially the government was unwilling to accept the defeat.

最初政府不愿意承认失败。

3. Sampdoria lost their unbeaten record with a 2-1 home defeat against Genoa.

桑普多利亚队主场1比2负于热那亚队之后，终止了自己的不败纪录。

4. They had their championship hopes dashed by a 3-1 defeat.

遭遇1比3的失利后，他们的冠军梦就此破灭。

5. Second-placed Auxerre suffered a surprising 2-0 home defeat to Nantes.

排名第二的欧塞尔队出人意料地在主场以0比2败给了南特队。

【defeat, beat, overcome, conquer, subdue, overthrow】
这组词都有“征服，战胜”的意思，其区别是：
defeat: 普通用词，多指在战争、比赛、竞选或辩论中战胜对手，侧重胜利的暂时性。
beat: 口笔语均可用，可与defeat换用。
overcome: 多指战胜或克服非物质的东西，如困难和不良习惯等。语气较弱也可指在斗争或竞争中战胜或压倒对方。
conquer: 侧重战胜和控制。书面用词。
subdue: 正式用词，与conquer同义，但强调失败后的臣服状态；也可用作借喻，表克制、压抑感情、欲望等。
overthrow: 指彻底击败对手，使其丧失力量和地位。