meritate

Meritate is an English verb meaning to deserve or earn something as a reward or merit. It is relatively rare in modern usage and is generally regarded as archaic or literary. The word derives from late Latin meritus, the past participle of mereri “to deserve, earn,” and reached English via Old French meriter and Early Modern usage.

In contemporary writing, speakers tend to use merit as a verb or merited as the past tense. When meritate is used, it is treated as a regular -ate verb (meritates, meritating, meritated), though actual usage is extremely uncommon and many dictionaries label the form obsolete or literary. The rarity of the term means it is most often encountered in historical texts, ceremonial language, or poetic contexts where a formal or antiquated tone is desired.

Examples are scarce in modern corpora; the concept is usually conveyed with phrases such as “to deserve recognition” or “to merit an award.” If meritate appears, it functions semantically like the standard verb to deserve, but its presence signals a stylistic archaism rather than a common usage.

See also: merit, merited, meritocracy, meritorious, deserv[e].