Wreak

Wreak (rēk) , intransitive verb

To reck; to care. [Obsolete] — Shakespeare

Wreak (rēk) , transitive verb

[Old English wreken to revenge, punish, drive out, Anglo-Saxon wrecan; akin to OFries. wreka, Old Saxon wrekan to punish, Dutch wreken to avenge, German rachen, Old High German rehhan, Icelandic reka to drive, to take vengeance, Gothic wrikan to persecute, Lithuanian vargas distress, vargti to suffer distress, Latin urgere to drive, urge, Greek e'i`rgein to shut, Sanskrit vrj to turn away. Compare Urge, Wreck, Wretch.]

To revenge; to avenge. [Archaic]

He should wreake him on his foes. — Chaucer

Another's wrongs to wreak upon thyself. — Spenser

Come wreak his loss, whom bootless ye complain. — Fairfax

To inflict or execute, especially in vengeance or passion; to hurl or drive; as, to wreak vengeance on an enemy; to wreak havoc.

On me let Death wreak all his rage. — Milton

Now was the time to be avenged on his old enemy, to wreak a grudge of seventeen years. — Macaulay

But gather all thy powers, And wreak them on the verse that thou dost weave. — Bryant

The word wrought is sometimes assumed to be the past tense of wreak, as the phrases wreak havoc and wrought havoc are both commonly used. In fact, wrought havoc is not as common as wreaked havoc. Whether wrought is considered as the past tense of wreak or of work, wrought havoc has essentially the same meaning. Etymologically, however, wrought is only the past tense of work.

Wreak , noun

[Compare Anglo-Saxon wrac exile, persecution, misery. See Wreak, transitive verb]

Revenge; vengeance; furious passion; resentment. [Obsolete] — Shak. Spenser