renege
/rɪˈneɪɡ
/ /rɪˈniːɡ /(also renegue)
verb [no object]
1Go back on a promise, undertaking, or contract: the government had reneged on its election promises...
- Older workers were among the first fired, and some hard-pressed corporations reneged on pension promises.
- To appease unions, he reneged on promised labor-market reforms.
- An hour ago your investor reneged on his promised half million.
Synonyms
default on, fail to honour, go back on, break, back out of, pull out of, withdraw from, retreat from, welsh on, backtrack on;
repudiate, retract;
go back on one's word, break one's word, break one's promise, do an about-face
informal cop out of, rat on
1.1 another term for revoke (sense 2).If a player reneges his/her team is penalized 4 points....
- To this C reneges his 5 (his privilege) and plays the 8 of diamonds (now the worst card in his hand) instead.
1.2 [with object] archaic Renounce or abandon: there’s one of them, anyhow, that didn’t renege him...
- The treaty and peace terms in favor of Haidar Ali were shamelessly reneged by the British and soon a second Mysore war ensued from 1780 to 1784.
Derivatives
reneger
- In general, play stops when a renege is figured out and the reneger gets points for that hand, while the others get the points they have at that point.
- The day following the election, this reneger dismissed that promise as 'old news'.
- Because of the fast pace of the game, catching a reneger is difficult.
Origin
Mid 16th century (in the sense 'desert'): from medieval Latin renegare, from Latin re- (expressing intensive force) + negare 'deny'.