Treated with disrespect or rudeness; spoken to or about in an offensive or hurtful way.
From Latin 'insultare,' meaning 'to jump on' or 'to trample,' combining 'in-' (on) and 'saltare' (to jump). The sense evolved from physical trampling to verbal disrespect over centuries.
It's wild that 'insult' literally means 'to jump on'—the metaphor shows how deeply violence and disrespect are connected in human language, because hurting someone emotionally was viewed as almost literally attacking them!
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