Hypertext Webster Gateway: "backbite"
From Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary (easton)
Backbite
In Ps. 15:3, the rendering of a word which means to run about
tattling, calumniating; in Prov. 25:23, secret talebearing or
slandering; in Rom. 1:30 and 2 Cor. 12:20, evil-speaking,
maliciously defaming the absent.
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (web1913)
Backbite \Back"bite`\, v. i. [2nd back, n., + bite]
To wound by clandestine detraction; to censure meanly or
spitefully (an absent person); to slander or speak evil of
(one absent). --Spenser.
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (web1913)
Backbite \Back"bite`\, v. i.
To censure or revile the absent.
They are arrant knaves, and will backbite. --Shak.
From WordNet (r) 1.7 (wn)
backbite
v : say mean things [syn: {bitch}]
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