provoke

verb

1. (transitive)To cause someone to become annoyed or angry.

   “Don't provoke the dog; it may try to bite you.”

   “In the meane time it chaunced, that Marcus Papyrius ſtroke one of the Galles on the heade with his ſtaffe, because he preſumed to ſtroke his bearde: with whiche iniurie the Gaulle beeing prouoked, ſlue Papyrius (as he ſate) with hys ſworde, and therewith the ſlaughter being begun with one, all the reſidue of thoſe auncient fatherly men as they ſat in theyr Chayres were ſlaine and cruelly murthered.”

   “Ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath.”

2. (transitive)To bring about a reaction.

   “To the poet the meaning is what he pleases to make it, what it provokes in his own soul.”

   “Thence Sish went forth into the world to destroy its cities, and to provoke his hours to assail all things, and to batter against them with the rust and with the dust.”

   “An old traditional prescription for provoking erotic inclinations ran as follows, The toe of the foot of a man, anointed with oil, or honey, or the ashes of a weasel.”

   “Spain were provoked into a response and Villa almost provided a swift equaliser when he rounded Hart but found the angle too acute and could only hit the side-netting.”

3. (obsolete)To appeal.

   “Even Arius and Pelagius durst provoke To what the centuries preceding spoke.”