Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary - deprecate

 transitive verb  (-cated; -cating)  Etymology: Latin deprecatus, past participle of deprecari to avert by prayer, from de- + precari to pray — more at pray  Date: 1628  1.  a. archaic to pray against (as an evil)  b. to seek to avert ~ the wrath…of the Roman people — Tobias Smollett  2. to express disapproval of  3.  a. play down ; make little of speaks five languages…but ~s this facility — Time  b. belittle, disparage the most reluctantly admired and least easily ~d of…novelists — New Yorker  • deprecatingly adverb  • deprecation noun