defamation
    n 1: a false accusation of an offense or a malicious
         misrepresentation of someone's words or actions [syn:
         defamation, calumny, calumniation, obloquy,
         traducement, hatchet job]
    2: an abusive attack on a person's character or good name [syn:
       aspersion, calumny, slander, defamation,
       denigration]

Defamation \Def`a*ma"tion\, n. [OE. diffamacioun, F.
   diffamation. See Defame.]
   Act of injuring another's reputation by any slanderous
   communication, written or oral; the wrong of maliciously
   injuring the good name of another; slander; detraction;
   calumny; aspersion.
   [1913 Webster]

   Note: In modern usage, written defamation bears the title of
         libel, and oral defamation that of slander. --Burrill.
         [1913 Webster]

DEFAMATION, tort. The speaking slanderous words of a person so as, de bona 
fama aliquid detrahere, to hurt his good fame. Vide Slander. 
     2. In the United States, the remedy for defamation is by an action on 
the case, where the words are slanderous. 
     3. In England, besides the remedy by action, proceedings may be 
instituted in the ecclesiastical court for redress of the injury. The 
punishment for defamation, in this court, is payment of costs and penance 
enjoined at the discretion of the judge. When the slander has been privately 
uttered, the penance may be ordered to be performed in a private place; when 
publicly uttered, the sentence must be public, as in the church of the 
parish of the defamed party, in time of divine service,, and the defamer may 
be required publicly to pronounce that by such words, naming them, as set 
forth in the sentence, he had defamed the plaintiff, and, therefore, that he 
begs pardon, first, of God, and then of the party defamed, for uttering such 
words. Clerk's Assist. 225; 3 Burn's Eccl. Law, Defamation, pl. 14; 2 Chit. 
Pr. 471 Cooke on Def.