betake
Americanverb (used with object)
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to cause to go (usually used reflexively).
She betook herself to town.
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Archaic. to resort or have recourse to.
verb
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to go; move
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archaic to apply (oneself) to
Etymology
Origin of betake
First recorded in 1175–1225, betake is from the Middle English word bitaken. See be-, take
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Gradually the household betake themselves to bed and Authoress Dix reviews them as they lie, wrapped in their several irremediable miseries.
From Time Magazine Archive
Propaganda for return of the pre-machine modes of production is equivalent to preaching that man should do away with clothes, grow hair all over his body and betake himself to the forests.
From Time Magazine Archive
"And it is here that I must betake me to my Lord Don Quixote in order that I may learn of him how to confront ridicule and overcome it."
From Time Magazine Archive
Aving already ad bestselling olidays in Paris and Manhattan, Mrs. 'Arris as ardly anyplace else to betake erself to but the Ouse of Commons.
From Time Magazine Archive
Some breakfast as early as seven o'clock; others betake themselves by six to their ateliers, or lectures—or pretend to do so—returning, in two or three hours, to a later meal.
From Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, No. 15, August, 1851 by Various
His rival, unhorsed in the lists of love, had betaken himself, it seemed, to other lists, in which he would as surely be beaten.
From The Great House by Stanley John Weyman
So saying, he sallied forth, pacing round the fortifications in quest of Oswald, where he learnt that he and Wulfhere had betaken themselves towards the valley.
From The Last of the Vikings by John Bowling
Towards evening the bells had ceased; the frequenters of inn parlours too had betaken themselves to their farms, lying peacefully in the light of the setting sun.
From Autumn Glory The Toilers of the Field by Ren? Bazin
During this dialogue, the officers had approached one of the five taverns, composing nearly a third part of the infant town, towards which the ill-looking strangers had betaken themselves.
From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 60, No. 369, July 1846 by Various
But on the appointment of Xenocrates to the chair of the Academy, Aristotle, the most eminent of Plato’s scholars, had betaken himself to another Gymnasium, called the Lyceum, which became the resort of the Peripatetics.
From History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Age. Volume II by John Dunlop
When conscience has extorted a confession, she returns him to his monastery and God, betaking herself to the Garden of Allah, gem of the desert, where their courtship began and her days will end.
From Time Magazine Archive
He did not see her again that night, betaking himself at a very late hour to his own dressing-room.
From Is He Popenjoy? by Anthony Trollope
I wished but to gaze once more upon her incomparable beauty—before betaking myself to a place where the opportunity could never occur again.
From Lost Lenore The Adventures of a Rolling Stone by Charles A. Beach
One is based upon itself, verum index sui; the other is based upon the impossibility of the reason, in spite of all its efforts, not betaking itself to truth and believing in it.
From Lectures on the true, the beautiful and the good by Victor Cousin
When the morning of the wedding had come, the lady, love-sick for the young farmer, instead of betaking herself to the kirk to be married, took to her bed, and the wedding was put off.
From Harper's Young People, November 4, 1879 An Illustrated Weekly by Various
President Herriot, having worn himself out calling for order, put on his silk hat and betook his full-dressed self from the Chamber as a sign that the session was suspended.
From Time Magazine Archive
At the close of the Players' Club's The School for Scandal, " America's greatest actress " betook herself to Washington to open a summer vaudeville tour in Barrie's The Twelve Pound Look.
From Time Magazine Archive
Harry Bridges knotted-a brown-and-yellow necktie around his matchstick neck one day and betook himself to San Francisco's federal court.
From Time Magazine Archive
Mr. Chamberlain betook him to his residence in Morpeth Mansions.
From Time Magazine Archive
When at last she left you, you lapsed at once into deep reverie: you betook yourself slowly to pace the gallery.
From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
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