abscond

Verb

abscond (third-person singular simple present absconds, present participle absconding, simple past and past participle absconded)

1. (intransitive) To flee, often secretly; to steal away.
   • The thieves absconded with our property.
   • […] that very homesickness which, in regular armies, drives so many recruits to abscond at the risk of stripes and of death.1848, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 13, in The History of England

   Synonyms:

   flee, run away, steal away

   1. (intransitive) To hide, conceal, or absent oneself clandestinely, with the intent to avoid legal process
      • I've often speculated why you don't return to America. Did you abscond with the church funds? Run off with a senator's wife? I like to think you killed a man. It's the Romantic in me.1942, Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, Howard Koch, Casablanca, spoken by Captain Renault (Claude Rains)
      • Andy did break his bargain, lurked in the neighborhood a few days, and then, being pursued by the sheriff, absconded to parts unknown.1969, John Niven, Years of Turmoil: Civil War and Reconstruction, page 229
   2. (intransitive) To abandon a hive.
      • [European honey bees] raise large colonies, hoard large quantities of honey, are more gentle than other species and almost never abscond.2003, Randy Carl Lynn, Raising Healthy Honey Bees, Christian Veterinary Mission, page 10
2. (intransitive) To hide, to be in hiding or concealment.
   • the Marmotto, […] which absconds all Winter doth […] live upon its own Fat.1691-1735, John Ray, The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation
3. (transitive, uncommon) To evade, to hide or flee from.
   • The captain absconded his responsibility.
   • If the distress situation is solved successfully, the anonymous shipowner will reap the commercial benefit, if the situation ends in disaster, the shipowner will hide behind an anonymous post box in a foreign country and will abscond responsibility.2006, Aldo E. Chircop, Olof Lindén, Places of Refuge for Ships, →ISBN
4. (obsolete, transitive) To conceal; to take away.
   • for having applied to the Side of the Head any thin black Body, such as the Brim of a Hat, so as it may abscond the Objects that are upon that Side1759, William Porterfield, edited by G. Hamilton and John Balfour, treatise on the eye, the manner and phaenomena of vision, volume 2
   • They examined every prisoner by himself (who were in all about two hundred and fifty persons) where they had absconded the rest of their goods1684, John Esquemeling, Henry Powell, The Buccaneers of America, published 2010, page 161

   Synonyms:

   conceal