rapine
English edit
Etymology edit
From Middle English rapyne, from Old French rapine, from Latin rapīna, from rapiō. Doublet of rape and ravine.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
rapine (countable and uncountable, plural rapines)
- The seizure of someone's property by force; pillage, plunder.
- c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene ii:
- This countrey ſwarmes with vile outragious men,
That liue by rapine and by lawleſſe ſpoile,
Fit ſouldiers for the wicked Tamburlaine.
- c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
- Good Rapine, stab him: he is a ravisher.
- 1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “The Author’s Great Love of His Native Country. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume II, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part IV (A Voyage to the Houyhnhnms), page 262:
- And it was peculiar in their Temper, that they were fonder of what they could get by Rapine or Stealth at a greater diſtance, than much better Food provided for them at home.
- 1848, Thomas Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession Of James II:
- men who were impelled to war quite as much by the desire of rapine as by the desire of glory
- 1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 01:
- The Bat—they called him the Bat. Like a bat he chose the night hours for his work of rapine; like a bat he struck and vanished, pouncingly, noiselessly; like a bat he never showed himself to the face of the day.
- 1951, Isaac Asimov, Foundation (1974 Panther Books Ltd publication), Part V: “The Merchant Princes”, Ch.10, pp.157–158:
- “You could join Wiscard’s remnants in the Red Stars. I don’t know, though, if you’d call that fighting or piracy. Or you could join our present gracious viceroy — gracious by right of murder, pillage, rapine, and the word of a boy Emperor, since rightfully assassinated.”
Translations edit
seizure of someone's property by force
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References edit
- The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition (2000).
Verb edit
rapine (third-person singular simple present rapines, present participle rapining, simple past and past participle rapined)
- (transitive) To plunder.
- 1619, George Buck, History of Richard III:
- A Tyrant doth not only rapine his Subjects, but spoils and robs Churches.
Translations edit
plunder
Anagrams edit
Italian edit
Noun edit
rapine f