▪ I. emancipate, ppl. a. Now chiefly poet.
(ɪˈmænsɪpət)
[ad. L. ēmancipāt-us, pa. pple. of ēmancipāre: see next.]
= emancipated.
| 1605 Bacon Adv. Learn. ii. 36, I doe take the Consideration..of Humane Nature to be fit to be emancipate, & made a knowledge by it self. 1785 Cowper Task ii. 39 Slaves..themselves once ferried o'er the wave..are emancipate and loos'd. c 1800 Coleridge Picture 119 Emancipate From passion's dreams. 1880 Daily Tel. 19 Feb., He is..conspicuously emancipate from musical prejudices. |
▪ II. emancipate, v.
(ɪˈmænsɪpeɪt)
[f. L. ēmancipāt- ppl. stem of ēmancipāre of same meaning.]
1. trans. In Roman Law: To release or set free (a child or wife) from the patria potestas, the power of the pater familias, thus making the person so set free sui juris.
| 1651 Hobbes Leviath. ii. xxiv. 131 Requires no more of them, then Fathers require of the Children, whom they emancipate. 1741 T. Robinson Gavelkind ii. 11 In case a Son was dead or emancipated. 1875 Maine Hist. Inst. vii. 217 The Son discharged from Paternal Power is emancipated. |
2. gen. a. To set free from control; to release from legal, social, or political restraint.
In mod. lang. the word suggests primarily the liberation of slaves, the other uses being often felt as transf. from this.
| 1625 Donne Serm. 27 To emancipate them from the Tyrant. 1768–74 Tucker Lt. Nat. (1852) II. 123 As an apprentice is emancipated by running away. a 1832 Bentham Wks. 1843 II. 502 Individuals who have been emancipated, or have emancipated themselves from governments. 1832 H. Martineau Irel. 117 The law has..emancipated us from our civil disabilities. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. I. 651 That the convicts should be carried beyond sea as slaves, that they should not be emancipated for ten years. 1851 Gladstone Glean. VI. lxviii. 44 Suppose the Colonial Churches emancipated. a 1876 J. H. Newman Hist. Sk. I. i. ii. 84 Workmen emancipating themselves from their employer. |
b. absol.
| 1775 Dk. Richmond Let. in Burke's Corr. (1844) II. 29 If our [colonies] emancipate, it will..be some good to humanity. |
c. transf. and fig. To set free from intellectual or moral restraint. Also refl.
| 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. 25 We become emancipated from testimoniall engagements. 1699 Evelyn Acetaria 152 From many troublesome and slavish Impertinencies..he had Emancipated and freed himself. 1710 Berkeley Princ. Hum. Knowl. §14 To emancipate our thoughts from particular objects. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. 558 Those evil passions..were on a sudden emancipated from control. 1850 Kingsley Alt. Locke iii. (1876) 41, I was emancipated from modern Puritanism. 1875 Jowett Plato (ed. 2) V. 126 Plato has not emancipated himself from the limitations of ancient politics. |
† 3. To deliver into servitude or subjection; to enslave; (because emancipation in Roman Law was effected by fictitious sale). Obs.
| 1629 H. Burton Babel no Beth. 71 Emancipate..is, to captiuate ones selfe to another, as well as to free. 1629 Cholmley ibid. 70 A wiues Emancipating herselfe to another husband. 1752 Smart Hop Garden i. 195 To dalliance vile and sloth Emancipated. |