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revanchist

/ɹəˈvɑnt͡ʃɪst/noun, adjective

revanchist is a noun meaning “A revanchist person; occasionally, anyone seeking vengeance” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled R-E-V-A-N-C-H-I-S-T, and it appears about once in every 28 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of revanchist is revanchists.

What does revanchist mean?

noun

  1. 1

    A revanchist person; occasionally, anyone seeking vengeance.

adjective

  1. 1

    Seeking revenge or otherwise advocating retaliation, especially against a nation which has previously defeated and humiliated the revanchist party in war. Originally referred to the French indignation over losing Alsace-Lorraine to Germany in the Franco-Prussian War.

    As execrable as the Supreme Court’s decisions have been, they are of a piece with the conservative rulings from lower court judges who see no issue with laundering a revanchist policy agenda through contorted rulings.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce revanchist?

  • UK /ɹɪˈvæn(t)ʃɪst/
  • US /ɹəˈvɑnt͡ʃɪst/

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-revanchist.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of revanchist

  • revanchists plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is revanchist?

Revanchist appears about once in every 28 million words in written English, the 159,707th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Revanchist in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchrevanchiste, revanchard, revancharde (revanchist, vengeful person)
GermanRevanchist, Revanchistin (revanchist, vengeful person), revanchistisch (advocating a policy of revanche)
Portugueserevanchista (revanchist, vengeful person)
Spanishrevanchista (revanchist, vengeful person)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does revanchist come from?

From French revanchiste, from revanche (“revenge”) + -ist.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).