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Definition of derogate : 1. Diminished in value; dishonored; degraded.
2. To act beneath one- s rank, place, birth, or character; to degenerate.
3. To annul in part; to repeal partly; to restrict; to limit the action of; - said of a law.
4. To lessen; to detract from; to disparage; to depreciate; - said of a person or thing.
5. To take away; to detract; to withdraw; - usually with from.

Synonyms:

smirch, run down, attack, understate, asperse, deprecate, denigrate, sully, pick at, minimise, discredit, slight, downgrade, insult, calumniate, slander, belittle, smear, show, humiliate, talk down, downplay, besmirch, minimize

depreciate, malign, abrade, detract, diminish, decry, reduce, defame, lessen, discount, disparage, cast aspersion

Usage examples:

• When the commonalty ratified this law, and gave him power to select those of the knights whom he approved of, to be judges, he was invested with a sort of kingly power, and the senate itself submitted to receive his advice in matters of difficulty; nor did he advise anything that might derogate from the honor of that body. - "Plutarch-Lives-of-the-noble-Grecians-and-Romans", Clough, Arthur Hugh.
• The religious public of a petty town in the thirteenth century round the deathbed of a royal saint would of course treasure up most carefully all incidents connected with her latter days; but they would hardly record sentiments or expressions which might seem to their notions to derogate in anyway from her saintship. - "The Saint's Tragedy", Charles Kingsley.
• Undoubtedly, there is some secret relation between the appearance of male eggs and the construction of these cells; for it is a law of nature from which bees never derogate. - "New observations on the natural history of bees", Francis Huber.