[f. the sb.]
1. Chess. (trans.) To give checkmate to: see the sb. sense 1. (Now, commonly, to MATE.)
1789. Twiss, Chess, II. 165. A pawn which was hidden behind a castle checkmated me without mercy.
1847. Staunton, Chess-pl. Handbk., 39. He must checkmate his adversary in fifty moves on each side at most.
1856. Whately, Bacon’s Ess., xxii. Annot. (ed. 2), 215. He is like a chess-player who takes several pawns, but is checkmated.
2. transf. To arrest or defeat utterly, discomfit. In mod. use, often: to defeat or frustrate the ‘game’ or scheme of (any one) by a counter-movement.
a. 1400. Octouian, 1746. There was many an hethen hounde, that they chekmatyde [So MS. clearly].
a. 1529. Skelton, Deedmans Hed, 30. Oure days be datyd To be chekmatyd With drawttys of deth.
1571. Golding, Calvin on Ps. x. 13. He is despitefully pulled out of his throne, and after a sort checkmated.
1603. Florio, Montaigne, II. xxxiv. (1632), 414. As an impetuous or raging torrent … shockes and checkmates what ere it meeteth withall.
[1649. Bounds Publ. Obed., 58. At this distance he [Jas. I.] contrived how to extinguish or check that mate [the Kirk] there.]
1868. E. Edwards, Ralegh, I. xxvi. 665. Some … had their own reasons for checkmating the Spaniards in relation to Ralegh, if they could.
1882. J. H. Blunt. Ref. Ch. Eng., II. 10. To checkmate their dangerous rival instantly.
1884. Manch. Exam., 2 May, 4/7. It will need a stringent clause to checkmate the ingenuity of the local taxmasters.
