Word: emancipate Part of Speech: verb Etymology: Learned borrowing from Latin ēmancipātus (“liberated, emancipated”) + English -ate (suffix forming verbs, and adjectives with the sense ‘characterized by the specified thing’). Ēmancipātus is the perfect passive participle of ēmancipō (“to declare (someone) free and independent of another’s power, emancipate; to give (something) from one’s authority or power into that of another, to alienate, transfer; to cause (oneself or someone) to become another’s slave; to make (someone) subservient”), from ē- (a variant of ex- (prefix meaning ‘away; out’)) + mancipō (“to sell; to transfer”) (from manceps (“owner, possessor; purchaser; etc.”) + -ō (suffix forming infinitives of first-conjugation verbs)). The verb emancipate has verb sense 1.1 (“to set free”) and verb sense 1.3 (“(obsolete) to place under one’s control”) which are contradictory. The Latin word ēmancipō had the same senses, and the Oxford English Dictionary notes that according to the Latin grammarian Paulus Festus (fl. 8th century) this is because both actions were effected by the legal process of mancipation. Pronunciation: /ɪˈmæn(t)sɪpeɪt/, /əˈmæn(t)səˌpeɪt/, /i-/ 1. To set free (a person or group) from the oppression or restraint of another; to liberate. Labels: transitive Example: [T]his was his [God's] first work,to redeem, to vindicate them from the usurper, to deliver them from the intruder, to emancipate them from the tyrant, to cancel the covenant between hell and them, and restore them. so far to their liberty, as that they might come to their first Master if they would: this was redeeming. Example: Enlightened ministers like Friedrich Karl vom und zum Stein and Karl August von Hardenberg enacted a comprehensive series of domestic reforms. They transformed backward, semifeudal Prussia into a modern state: abolishing serfdom, granting self-government to towns, with elected town councils replacing royal appointees; and formally emancipating the Jews, granting them full citizenship for the first time, even if full social acceptance remained wanting. 2. To set free (a person or group) from the oppression or restraint of another; to liberate. Labels: transitive Example: to emancipate a colony Example: Abundant harvests and patient industry amply supplied the wants of Presidio and Mission. Isolated from the family of nations, the wars which shook the world concerned them not so much as the last earthquake; the struggle that emancipated their sister colonies on the other side of the continent to them had no suggestiveness. 3. To set free (a person or group) from the oppression or restraint of another; to liberate. Labels: also, reflexive, transitive Example: to pass a law emancipating slaves Example: The number of prisoners whom [George] Jeffreys transported was eight hundred and forty-one. These men, more wretched than their associates who suffered death, were distributed into gangs, and bestowed on persons who enjoyed favour at court. The conditions of the gift were that the convicts should be carried beyond sea as slaves, that they should not be emancipated for ten years, and that the place of their banishment should be some West Indian island. 4. To set free (a person or group) from the oppression or restraint of another; to liberate. Labels: transitive Example: The child was emancipated from her parents Example: The Procreation, or Children of a Common-vvealth, are thoſe vve call Plantations, or Colonies; […] And vvhen a Colony is ſetled, they are either a Common-vvealth of themſelves, diſcharged of their ſubjection to their Soveraign that ſent them, (as hath been done by many Common-vvealths of antient time,) in vvhich caſe the Common-vvealth from vvhich they vvent, vvas called their Metropolis, or Mother, and requires no more of them, then Fathers require of the Children, vvhom they emancipate, and make free from their domeſtique government, vvhich is Honour, and Friendſhip; or elſe they remain united to their Metropolis, as vvere the Colonies of the people of Rome; and then they are no Common-vvealths themſelves, but Provinces, and parts of the Common-vvealth that ſent them. 5. Often followed by from: to free (oneself or someone, or something) from some constraint or controlling influence (especially when evil or undue); also, to free (oneself or someone) from mental oppression. Labels: also, figuratively, reflexive, transitive Example: Education can emancipate us from error or prejudices. Example: The vvhole Epiſtle deſerves the Reading, for the excellent Advice he gives on this and other Subjects; and hovv from many troubleſome and ſlaviſh Impertinencies, grovvn into Habit and Cuſtom (old as he vvas) he had Emancipated and freed himſelf: […] 6. To place (something) under one's control; specifically (chiefly reflexive), to cause (oneself or someone) to become the slave of another person; to enslave; also, to subjugate (oneself or someone). Labels: obsolete, transitive Example: He that vvill ſinne vnto death, or ſinne ſo farre as to put himſelfe into the ſtate of damnation; muſt ſinne ſo farre, as vtterly to ſeparate, and cut off himſelfe from Chriſt, vtterly to extirpate all the ſeeds and habits of true and ſauing grace vvhich are vvithin him, and vvholly to emancipate and inthrall himſelfe to the ſeruice of ſinne and Sathan: […] 7. To become free from the oppression or restraint of another. Labels: intransitive, obsolete Example: We shall hardly induce black men to believe that if their stomachs be full, it matters little about their brains. They already dimly perceive that the paths of peace winding between honest toil and dignified manhood call for the guidance of skilled thinkers, the loving, reverent comradeship between the black lowly and the black men emancipated by training and culture.