Kilo Lingo

Line drawing of renversi
Coloured illustration of renversi
#1897 of 5,000 Core 5000

Translation

to overturn, to knock over; to overthrow

Word origin

A straight borrowing of French renverser, 'to turn upside down', built in French from re- and envers 'inside out', which goes back to Latin inversus, from in- plus vertere 'to turn'.

Origin
French
Root
renverser
English cognates
reverse, invert, versus

Examples

.

The wind overturned the table in the garden.

.

He knocked his glass over onto the book.

.

The people overthrew the bad king.

The - at the front is a false seam, and a subtle one because Esperanto really does have a prefix - meaning again or back: to come back, i to redo. So looks like - plus a verb nversi. There is no such verb. The - came over already fused inside the French word, and renvers- is one root. The test is the one that always works: strip the supposed prefix and see whether what is left is a word. It is not.

The verb is transitive and covers the whole range English splits between several words: knocking a glass over, capsizing a boat, overturning a verdict, overthrowing a government. i is the intransitive - the boat capsized on its own. Also useful is the figurative sense of stunning someone: , the news floored me.

Where this fits

Add to review queue

Track this word in your spaced-repetition queue and be tested on it at the right interval.

Go to my review queue

Esperanto · Free printables

renversi: worksheet, infographic and listicle

Free printable study downloads for the Esperanto word "renversi" (to overturn, to knock over; to overthrow): a worksheet with the answer key built in, an infographic, and a sentence listicle. Open any one to view, print or save.

Free for members

The printable worksheets, infographics and PDFs are free with an account. Start a free week and download as many as you like.

Start your free week

This word is part of lesson 38.