underprize

underprize

English

Etymology

under- +‎ prize

Verb

underprize (third-person singular simple present underprizes, present participle underprizing, simple past and past participle underprized)

1. (transitive) To undervalue; to underestimate.
   • c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act III, scene ii]:

     […] Yet look, how far
     The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow
     In underprizing it, so far this shadow
     Doth limp behind the substance.

   • 1625, Samuel Purchas (editor), “English Plantations, Discoveries, Acts, and Occurrents, in Virginia and Summer Ilands since the Yeere 1606 till 1624” in Purchas His Pilgrimes, Part 4 in Five Bookes, London: Henry Fetherstone, Chapter 6, Section 4, p. 1756,

     […] euery man ouer-ualuing his owne worth, would be a Commander: euery man vnder prizing anothers value, denied to be commanded.

   • 1631, Francis Quarles, The Historie of Samson, London: John Marriott, Section 23, Meditation 23, p. 142,

     Teach me to under prize this life, and I

     Shall finde my losse the easier, when I dye;

   • 1923, Louis Joseph Vance, The Lone Wolf Returns, New York: Grosset & Dunlap, Chapter 14,

     No: it would never do to underprize this proof of good will or to read in Liane’s warning any spirit but one of the most earnest anxiety.

   • 1996, Seamus Heaney, “An Invocation” in The Spirit Level, New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, p. 32,

     I underprized your far-out, blathering genius.