discountenance

From Middle French descontenancer (compare French décontenancer).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪsˈkaʊntənəns/

discountenance (third-person singular simple present discountenances, present participle discountenancing, simple past and past participle discountenanced)

1. (transitive) To have an unfavorable opinion of; to deprecate or disapprove of.
   • 1855, George Bancroft, History of the United States, from the Discovery of the American Continent, London: Routledge, Volume V, Chapter XXX, p. 74,

     A town meeting was convened to discountenance riot.

   • 1908, Edward Carpenter, The Intermediate Sex, London: George Allen & Unwin, 1921, Chapter 4, p. 90,

     So far from friendship being an institution whose value is recognised and understood, it is at best scantily acknowledged, and is often actually discountenanced and misunderstood.

   • 1934, George Orwell, Burmese Days:

     Mr Macgregor stiffened at the word 'nigger', which is discountenanced in India.

   • 1949, George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Part One, Chapter 2,

     'Mrs' was a word somewhat discountenanced by the Party—you were supposed to call everyone 'comrade'—but with some women one used it instinctively.

2. (transitive) To abash, embarrass or disconcert.
   • 1671, John Milton, “Book the Second”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: Printed by J. M[acock] for John Starkey […], OCLC 228732398, lines 216–220, page 39:

     How would one look from his Majeſtick brow, / Seated as on the top of Vertues hill, / Diſcount'nance her deſpiſ'd, and put to rout / All her array, her female pride deject, / Or turn to reverent awe? […]

   • 1820, Walter Scott, chapter 16, in Ivanhoe‎:

     The hermit was somewhat discountenanced by this observation.

3. (transitive) To refuse countenance or support to; to discourage.

discountenance (uncountable)

1. Cold treatment; disapprobation.