rapine

plural rapines

1. countableuncountableThe seizure of someone's property by force; pillage; plunder.

   Good Rapine, stab him: he is a ravisher.

   c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]

   5 more examples

   This countrey ſwarmes with vile outragious men, That liue by rapine and by lawleſſe ſpoile, Fit ſouldiers for the wicked Tamburlaine.

   c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene ii

   Justice and truth are the common ties of society; and therefore, even out-laws and robbers, who break with all the world besides, must keep faith and rules of equity amongst themselves, or else they cannot hold together. But will any one say, that those that live by fraud or rapine, have innate principles of truth and justice which they allow and assent to?

   1689 (indicated as 1690), [John Locke], chapter III, in An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding. […], London: […] Eliz[abeth] Holt, for Thomas Basset, […], →OCLC

   And it was peculiar in their Temper, that they were fonder of what they could get by Rapine or Stealth at a greater diſtance, than much better Food provided for them at home.

   1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “The Author’s Great Love of His Native Country. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume II, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part IV (A Voyage to the Houyhnhnms), page 262

   men who were impelled to war quite as much by the desire of rapine as by the desire of glory

   1848, Thomas Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession Of James II

   The Bat—they called him the Bat. Like a bat he chose the night hours for his work of rapine; like a bat he struck and vanished, pouncingly, noiselessly; like a bat he never showed himself to the face of the day.

   1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 01

present singular third person rapines · participle present rapining · participle past rapined · past rapined

1. transitiveTo plunder.

   A Tyrant doth not only rapine his Subjects, but spoils and robs Churches.

   1619, George Buck, History of Richard III