- 1to hurt someone physically or mentally in order to punish them or make them tell you something torture somebody Many of the rebels were captured and tortured by secret police. torture somebody into doing something He was tortured into giving them the information.
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- 2torture somebody to make someone feel extremely unhappy or anxious synonym torment He spent his life tortured by the memories of his childhood.
torture
verbNAmE//ˈtɔrtʃər//
[often passive]Verb Forms present simple I / you / we / they torture he / she / it tortures
past simple tortured
-ing form torturing
NAmE//ˈtɔrtʃərər//
nounSee torture in the Oxford Advanced Learner's DictionaryCheck pronunciation: torture