usurp

present singular third person usurps · participle present usurping · participle past usurped · past usurped

1. To seize and hold or use (powers, an office, a coat of arms, a right or copyright, etc) from another, without right (usually by illegitimate means).

   [S]o he dies, But soon revives, Death over him no power Shall long usurp […]

   1674, John Milton, “Book XII”, in Paradise Lost. […], 2nd edition, London: […] S[amuel] Simmons […], →OCLC, page 326

   3 more examples

   […] usurped or took any name or title of honor or dignity. In many cases it happened that persons who had usurped arms without authority, entered their names […]

   1848, The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, page 343

   In this case, you have usurped the copyright owner's reasonably expected right to make a derivative work[.]

   2021, Carol Simpson, Sara E. Wolf, Copyright for Schools: A Practical Guide, page 199

   Most Republicans in Congress are complying as Mr. Trump usurps the power of the national legislature, as laid out in Article 1 of the Constitution.

   2025 February 25, Linda Feldmann, “How Trump skirts checks and balances unlike any modern-day US president”, in The Christian Science Monitor

2. To take the place of someone or something else; to supplant.

   The recent authorities have usefully drawn attention to the need to ensure that any assessment of the merits of a case does not usurp careful attention to the criteria in section 10(9), to which we now turn.

   2016, Stephen Gilmore, Lisa Glennon, Hayes and Williams' Family Law, page 484

   2 more examples

   But if now / You ſhould (as cruell fathers do) proclame / Your right, and Tyrant like uſurp the glory / Of my peculiar honours, not deriv'd / From ſucceſſary, but purchas'd with my bloud, / Then I muſt ſtand firſt Champion for my ſelfe, / Againſt all interpoſers.

   c. 1619–1623, John Ford, “The Lawes of Candy”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, Act I, scene ii, page 52, column 1

   Jones answered all his questions with much civility, though he never remembered to have seen the petty-fogger before; and though he concluded, from the outward appearance and behaviour of the man, that he usurped a freedom with his betters, to which he was by no means intitled.

   1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC

3. obsoleteTo make use of.

   "[…] especially considering that even Matter it self, in which they tumble and wallow, which they feel with their hands and usurp with all their Senses […]"

   1653, Henry More, “appendix”, in An Antidote against Atheisme, or An Appeal to the Natural Faculties of the Minde of Man, whether There Be Not a God, London: […] Roger Daniel, […], →OCLC