abjure
/æbˈd͡ʒʊ(ə)ɹ/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: 1.82 in modern English
15
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To solemnly reject (someone or something); to abandon (someone or something) forever; to disavow, to disclaim, to repudiate.
Formal; Transitive verb
verb
To renounce (something) upon oath; to forswear; specifically, to recant or retract (a heresy or some other opinion); to withdraw.
Formal; Transitive verb
verb
To cause (someone) to recant or retract (a heresy or some other opinion).
Formal; Transitive verb
verb
Especially in abjure the realm: to swear an oath to leave (a place) forever.
Formal; Transitive verb
Example Sentences
- "to abjure errors"
- "Her[mia]. […] But I beſeech your Grace, that I may knovve / The vvorſt that may befall mee in this caſe, / If I refuſe to vved Demetrius. / The[seus]. Either to dy the death, or to abiure, / For euer, the ſociety of men."
- "She diſappeerd, and left me dark, I vvak'd / To find her, or for ever to deplore / Her loſs, and other pleaſures all abjure: […]"
- "[B]oth Charles [I] himself and his creature [William] Laud, while they abjured the innocent badges of Popery, retained all its worst vices, […]"
- "Only as thou abjurest self, / Lovest thy Brother more than pelf, / And drivest out the impish elf, // Sectarian pride, from all thy heart, / Canst thou have place, or lot, or part / Within the Heaven-created mart […]"
- "[S]he is an ardent golfer. Except during the season in town, she spends her year in golfing, either at St. Magnus or Pau, for, like all good Americans, she has long since abjured her native soil."
Etymology
From Late Middle English abjuren (“to give up (something); to recant or renounce (something) under oath”), from Anglo-Norman abjurer, Middle French abiurer, abjurer, and Old French abjurer (“to reject or renounce (something) on oath”) (modern French abjurer), and from their etymon Latin abiūrāre, the present active infinitive of abiūrō (“to deny on oath, recant, renounce, repudiate, abjure”), from ab- (prefix meaning ‘away from, from’) + iūro (“to take an oath, swear, vow”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂yew- (“(adjective) right; straight; upright; (noun) justice; law; right”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /æbˈd͡ʒʊ(ə)ɹ/
Usage
Inflected Forms
abjures (present, singular)
abjuring (participle, present)
abjured (participle, past)
abjured (past)
no-table-tags (table tags)
glossary (inflection template)
abjured (first person, past)
abjurest (archaic, present)
abjured (past, second person)
abjuredst (archaic, past)
abjureth (archaic, present)
abjured (past, singular)