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Settle a score

Idiomatic Phrase
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

To get revenge or settle a past grievance; references keeping score of wrongs owed, implying balancing accounts through retaliatory action to resolve old conflicts or debts.

Detailed Definition
Settle a score means to take revenge, correct an old grievance, or repay a perceived wrong. In poetry, the idiom can appear in feud, satire, family conflict, political struggle, or dramatic monologue. The accounting image treats injury as a debt that must be balanced, making justice and vengeance difficult to separate. A poet may use it to show the emotional arithmetic of resentment. It is useful for exploring memory, retaliation, honour, and the danger of living by old accounts.
Example
Example in poetry:
A revenge ballad might show the wronged brother returning to settle a score at harvest moon; In a comic poem, two rival bakers settle a score with pies instead of pistols; The phrase means to get revenge or resolve an old grievance; A poet can use it for conflict and closure.
Additional Notes
Settle a score means take revenge or repay an old grievance. The score may suggest accounts, games, or tallies of injury. In poetry, it suits feuds, family histories, political retaliation, ghostly justice, and tragic cycles of violence. Students should notice the accounting logic: pain is treated as a debt to be balanced. A poem may ask whether the score can ever truly be settled or whether revenge only adds new marks.
Also Known As
get revenge
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