abjure

verb

Etymology: From Late Middle English abjuren (“to give up (something); to recant or renounce (something) under oath”), from Anglo-Norman abjurer, Middle French abiurer, abjurer, and Old French abjurer (“to reject or renounce (something) on oath”) (modern French abjurer), and from their etymon Latin abiūrāre, the present active infinitive of abiūrō (“to deny on oath, recant, renounce, repudiate, abjure”), from ab- (prefix meaning ‘away from, from’) + iūro (“to take an oath, swear, vow”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂yew- (“(adjective) right; straight; upright; (noun) justice; law; right”).

1. To solemnly reject (someone or something); to abandon (someone or something) forever; to disavow, to disclaim, to repudiate.

   “to abjure errors”

   “Her[mia]. […] But I beſeech your Grace, that I may knovve / The vvorſt that may befall mee in this caſe, / If I refuſe to vved Demetrius. / The[seus]. Either to dy the death, or to abiure, / For euer, the ſociety of men.”

2. To renounce (something) upon oath; to forswear; specifically, to recant or retract (a heresy or some other opinion); to withdraw.

   “to abjure allegiance to a prince”

   “[T]he man ye write of, was of many thinges borne wrõge [wrong] in hande, & therin ſo ſore handeled that he was forced to for ſwere and abiure certaine hereſyes, & openly to penance therfore, where he neuer held any ſuch.”

3. To cause (someone) to recant or retract (a heresy or some other opinion).

   “[T]hey vvere betrayed, and then many of them to the number of ſix or ſeven ſcore vvere abjured, and three or four of them burnt. Novv although vve knevv not hovv to call theſe Martyrs vvho ſo ſuffered, their Names no doubt are vvritten in the Book of Life.”

4. Especially in abjure the realm: to swear an oath to leave (a place) forever.

   “When a clerk heretofore was convicted of felony, he might have saved his life by abjuring the realm; that is, by departing the realm within a certain time appointed, and taking an oath never to return. But at this day all statutes for abjuration are repealed.”

   “[A]s a feme-covert recuſant may be impriſoned, ſo all others muſt, vvithin three months after conviction, either ſubmit and renounce their errors, or, if required ſo to do by four juſtices, muſt abjure and renounce the realm: and if they do not depart, or if they return vvithout the king's licence, they ſhall be guilty of felony, and ſuffer death as felons.”

5. To cause or compel (someone) to leave a place forever; to banish.

   “The ſtrong effect of theyr conceiued ire, / Vrging the vveake King vvith a violent hand, / T' abiure thoſe falſe Lords from the troubled land.”

   “About this time a ſubject brought in a Bull of Excommunication againſt another ſubject of this Realm, and publiſhed it to the Lord Treaſurer of England, and this vvas by the ancient Common-Law of England adjudged Treason againſt the King, his Crovvn and dignity, for the vvhich, the offender ſhould have been dravvn and hanged, but at the great inſtance of the chancelour and Treaſurer, he vvas onely abjured the Realm for ever.”

6. To solemnly reject; to abandon forever.

   “Eaſily canſt thou find one miſerable, / And not inforc'd oft-times to part from truth; / If it may ſtand him more in ſtead to lye, / Say and unſay, feign, flatter, or abjure?”

7. To recant or retract a heresy on oath.

   “Nor neuer yet found I ani. j. [any one] but he would once abiure, though he neuer intended to kepe his othe.”

   “And going toward the Justice Gate, many said to him, "Recant! Recant! Don't insist on dying," and he said, "Christ died for us." […] At the Field of Justice, one said to him he should do as a certain monk, his superior, had done, abjuring: but Michael answered that he would not abjure, and I saw many in the crowd agree and urge Michael to be strong: so I and many others realized those were his followers, and we moved away from them.”

8. To swear an oath to leave a place forever.

   “I Abiowre⸝ I forſake myne errours as an heretyke dothe⸝ or forſwere the kynges landes⸝ ie abiure, prime coniugationis.”

   “Well to bee ſhort, what for the cauſes before recited, as alſo for that they had once alreadie abiured, and yet (as they terme it) fell againe into relapſe, they were both (as you haue heard) in the end burned together in Smithfield: […]”