Provoke

·vi To appeal. [A Latinism].

II. Provoke ·vi To cause provocation or anger.

III. Provoke ·vt To call forth; to call into being or action; ·esp., to incense to action, a faculty or passion, as love, hate, or ambition; hence, commonly, to incite, as a person, to action by a challenge, by taunts, or by defiance; to Exasperate; to Irritate; to offend intolerably; to cause to retaliate.