v. [UN-2 4, 5.]
1. trans. To dislodge from a dwelling.
1614. T. Adams, Devils Banquet, 104. Hee gets possession of their affections, whence all the power of man cannot vntenant him.
2. To deprive of a tenant or tenants.
1640. Shirley, St. Patrick for Irel., I. i. You know I can Untenant hell, dispeople the wide air.
1796. Coleridge, Destiny of Nations, 35. All Those blind Omniscients, those Almighty Slaves Untenanting creation of its God.
1799. Monthly Rev., XXVIII. 528. It is only wonderful that the official cadastres should not wholly have untenanted the soil.
1832. R. Chambers, Eminent Scotsmen, I. 46. The Reformation untenanted its walls.
1846. T. D’Arcy M‘Gee, Gallery Irish Writers, 30. They even laid hands upon the Calendar of Saints, and Dempster and David Camerarius, with Iconoclastic zeal, began to untenant every niche in the national temple of Ireland, and thence to build up a pyramid of piety and learning on their own soil.
1861. Ld. Lytton & Fane, Tannhäuser, 67. I, whose heart of all that lived in it He hath untenanted.
3. To depart from, to quit.
1795. Coleridge, Lines at Shurton Bars, iv. Untenanting its beauteous clay My Sara’s soul has wing’d its way.
