manumit

American  

[man-yuh-mit] / ˌmæn jəˈmɪt /

verb (used with object)

manumitted, manumitting

1. to release from slavery or servitude.

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manumit British  

/ ˌmænjʊˈmɪt /

verb

1. (tr) to free from slavery, servitude, etc; emancipate

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Other Word Forms

• manumitter
  noun
• unmanumitted
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of manumit

1375–1425; late Middle English < Latin manūmittere, earlier manū ēmittere to send away from (one's) hand, i.e., to set free. See manus, emit

Explanation

To manumit is to set free, or to release a slave from slavery. During slavery in the United States, it was rare for a slave owner to manumit his slaves. Manumit comes from a Latin word meaning “set forth from the hand,” which happens when a slave owner frees a slave. The terrible history of slavery includes stories of owners who might manumit a slave as a reward for serving in their stead in the Revolutionary War, or simply to appear benevolent.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

manumit manumitted manumitting

If they were faithful and hardworking, the master would set them free, manumit them, when he died.

From "Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad" by Ann Petry

Under Marcus Aurelius the colleges were recognized as juristic persons, with power to manumit slaves and receive legacies.

From A History of Rome to 565 A. D. by Arthur Edward Romilly Boak

Now that provision was made for the freedmen the slaveholder felt at liberty to manumit his slaves.

From The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 by Various

At an early period, it became an established rule of discipline for the Society to disown any member, who refused to manumit his bondmen.

From Isaac T. Hopper by Lydia Maria Francis Child

By some unaccountable carelessness, he neglected to manumit her.

From A Romance of the Republic by Lydia Maria Francis Child

A comparable process took place in Cuba after the Spanish-American War, when American sugar companies acquired 60% of rural properties across Cuba, reducing independent farmers—largely manumitted slaves and their descendants—to the level of low-wage labor.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 3, 2026

Enslaved people who had been manumitted and allied fighters in times of conflict were likely to be granted citizenship.

From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023

Instead he’s manumitted by a combo platter of teen love and Paul Williams ballads.

From Salon ● May 29, 2017

But Tubman had plotted with Kessiah’s husband, who had been manumitted, to free his family.

From New York Times ● Feb. 24, 2017

It was from the first taught that the man who manumitted his slaves earned the approval of heaven, and all occasions of rejoicing, public and private, were fitly commemorated by the liberation of deserving individuals.

From The Byzantine Empire by Charles William Chadwick Oman

“The evidence is pretty strong that Johns Hopkins was an abolitionist,” Crenson said, and the possibility exists that he owned enslaved people for the possibility of manumitting them.

From Washington Post ● Jun. 5, 2021

The cruel practice of manumitting aged and helpless slaves became so general in this plantation, that the General Assembly passed a law regulating it, in February, 1728.

From History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens by George Washington Williams

Much as he had blamed Mr. Duncan for negligence in not manumitting her mother, he had fallen into the same snare.

From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 02, No. 08, June 1858 by Various

Manumiss′ion, act of manumitting or setting free from slavery.

From Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 2 of 4: E-M) by Various

There is in existence a document manumitting his slave, which, I am happy to say, is the only existing evidence that any ancestor of mine ever owned one.

From Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 by George Frisbie Hoar