placate
to calm someone down
Root
- plac: please, soothe, settle into calm
Other words with the plac root
- complacent: self-satisfied and unaware of risk
- complaisant: eager to please or agree with others
- implacable: unable to be appeased
- placatory: intended to soothe, calm, or appease
- placebo: inactive treatment that may still produce a perceived benefit
- placid: calm, peaceful, and undisturbed
- placidity: calmness or peaceful stillness
Placate is emergency calm-making: anger is hot, and you are trying to lower the temperature before it burns the room.
Maya tried to placate her furious study group with coffee, apologies, and a new plan.
Placate does not always mean solve. Sometimes it means soothe enough for the next sentence to be possible: an apology, a concession, a cup of coffee, a plan. The root gives the goal: make the situation calm or pleasing enough to continue.