spoliate
Americanverb (used with or without object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of spoliate
1715–25; < Latin spoliātus, past participle of spoliāre to spoil. See spoil, -ate 1
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:
"He intends to spoliate Austria as mercilessly as he formerly plundered Hamburg and the whole of Northern Germany," said the emperor, shrugging his shoulders.
From Andreas Hofer by Mühlbach, L. (Luise)
Here we have a grey antiquity without any mutilation of form, and merely spoliated of its benches.
From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 by Various
The Magyar nobles were now systematically spoliated on trumped-up charges of treason; hundreds of them were ruined.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 13, Slice 8 "Hudson River" to "Hurstmonceaux" by Various
"He that is accursed, let him be accursed still," was the pitiless anathema written in this spoliated effort of his new-born solicitousness.
From Far from the Madding Crowd by Hardy, Thomas
The guilds were spoliated of their possessions and liberties, and placed under the control, the fancy, and the bribery of the State's official.
From Mutual Aid; a factor of evolution by Kropotkin, Petr Alekseevich, kniaz
Charles had never shown undue respect for ecclesiastical property in Spain, and had on more than one occasion spoliated the Church for his own purposes.
From The Wives of Henry the Eighth and the Parts They Played in History by Hume, Martin Andrew Sharp
Collector Jacques Walter auctioned it off to banker Jean-Marc Vernes for $11 million in 1992; he then sued the French government for "spoliating" its value, and, incredibly, Walter won $29 million in compensation.
From Time Magazine Archive
If not good enough to help Russia spoil Turkey, the Czar must be taught he was good enough to help England prevent the spoliating scheme.
From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 by Various
Sieyès was equally disgusted, and made a speech of great force to show that to abolish tithes without an indemnity was spoliating the clergy to enrich the land-owners.
From Beacon Lights of History, Volume 09 European Statesmen by Lord, John
Those objects were—the enforcement of the laws; the suppression of a local insurrection; the reintegration of the disputed territory; the protection of the Capitol and its archives from the spoliating hands of traitors.
From The American Union Speaker by Philbrick, John D. (John Dudley)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
