v. [f. L. abdicāt-, ppl. stem of abdicā-re to renounce, disown, reject; f. ab off, away + dicā-re to proclaim, make known.]
1. trans. To proclaim or declare to be no longer one’s own, to disclaim, disown, cast off; esp. to disown or disinherit children. Now only as a tech. term of Rom. Law (L. abdicare filium, also patrem).
1541. Elyot, Im. God., 149. The father … doeth abdicate nowe and then one, that is to saie, putteth them out of his familie.
1644. Milton, Jus Populi, 34. Parents may not causelessly abdicate or disinherit children.
1697. Potter, Antiq. Greece, IV. xv. 351 (1715). Parents were allow’d to be reconcil’d to their children, but after that could never abdicate them again.
a. 1763. Shenstone, Essays, 117. Wherever I disesteemed, I would abdicate my first cousin.
1828. Sewell, Oxf. Pr. Essay, 70. Sons were exposed, abdicated, and sold by the laws of Solon.
† 2. To depose (from an office or dignity). Obs.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., I. 2. III. xv. 127 (1651). The Turks abdicated Cernutus, the next heir, from the empire.
† 3. refl. To formally cut oneself off, sever, or separate oneself from anything; esp. to divest oneself of an office (L. abdicare se magistratu). Obs.
1548. Hall, Chron., Introd. Hist. Hen. IV. 11 (1809). To perswade a man … to Abdicate himselfe from his empire and imperiall preheminence.
1689. Evelyn, Mem. (1857), II. 299. The great convention … resolved that King James … had by demise abdicated himself and wholly vacated his right.
1689. H. More, Myst. Iniq., 28. A Prince … who, by transgressing against the Laws of the Constitution, hath abdicated himself from the Government, and stands virtually Deposed.
† 4. trans. To put away, cast off, discard (anything). Obs.
1553–87. Foxe, A. & M. (1596), 333/2. The King our souereigne lord and maister cannot abdicate from himselfe this right.
1633. Bp. Hall, Hard Texts, 343. Neither hast thou, O Cyrus, so well known me as to abdicate thine Idolatry.
1642. Rogers, Naaman, 527. If the Lord Jesus purposely would defile and abdicate the seventh day Sabbath of the Jew.
1688–9. Lady R. Russell, Letters, No. 84. II. 11. Accidents may abdicate your opinion.
5. To formally give up (a right, trust, office, or dignity); to renounce, lay down, surrender, abandon; at first implying voluntary renunciation, but now including the idea of abandonment by default. See the parliamentary discussions of 1688.
1633. Bp. Hall, Hard Texts, 41. Abdicating our just privileges.
1688. Ld. Somers, Speech on the Vacation of the Throne. The word abdicate doth naturally and properly signify, entirely to renounce, throw off, disown, relinquish any thing or person, so as to have no farther to do with it; and that whether it be done by express words or in writing, (which is the sense your Lordships put upon it, and which is properly called resignation or cession) or, by doing such acts as are inconsistent with the holding, or retaining of the thing; which the Commons take to be the present case.
1726. De Foe, Hist. Devil (1810), I. i. 14. The thrones which the Devil and his followers abdicated and were deposed from.
1783. Johnson, Club Rules, in Boswell (1816), IV. 277. Whoever shall for three months together omit to attend … shall be considered as having abdicated the club.
1805. Foster, Essays, I. vii. 90. To have abdicated the dignity of reason.
1857. Prescott, Philip, I. i. 10. The Regent Mary formally abdicated her authority.
1857. Ruskin, Pol. Ec. Art, 5. A power not indeed to be envied … but still less to be abdicated or despised.
6. Comm. Law. Said of the insurer surrendering his rights of ownership to the underwriters.
1755. N. Magens, Ess. Insur., II. 36. The Owners of such old, Silver, or Pearls, cannot renounce or abdicate them to the Underwriters.
7. absol. (by ellipsis of the thing resigned, usually the throne or crown). To renounce or relinquish sovereignty, or its equivalent.
a. 1704. T. Brown, Epigr., Wks. 1730, I. 121. Either he must abdicate or thou.
1726. De Foe, Hist. Devil (1840), II. i. 181. The Devil abdicated for awhile.
1837. Carlyle, French Rev., I. VII. xi. 399. Is it not strange so few kings abdicate; and none yet heard of has been known to commit suicide?
1879. Gladstone, Gleanings, III. i. 5. The Majority have in virtue and effect abdicated, and their opponents are the true and genuine corporation.
