discommon

Verb

discommon (third-person singular simple present discommons, present participle discommoning, simple past and past participle discommoned)

1. (UK, historical) To deprive of the privilege of citizenship of a town or city.
   • But what punishment is laid vpon Recusants, by the rare clemencie of her Maiestie, any way comparable to those that Christian Emperours haue made against Recusants, or such as refused to communicate with the Church of Christ? They were discommoned from buying and selling, from bequeathing their...1600, Francis Hastings, An apologie or defence of the watch-word, page 161
   • Let us not leave our fellowship, and estrange our selves from Gods people[…]To be discommoned a Town, or for a Citizen to be banished a city, is a great evill: But to be an exile from Gods city, and discommoned [i.e. excommunicated] from the communion of Saints, this is lamentable indeed.1647, Paul Bayne, An Entire Commentary upon the Whole Epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Ephesians, page 277
2. (historical) To deprive (lands etc.) of commonable quality, by enclosing or appropriating.
   • She saw in front of her a two-storey house, standing back from the gravel pathway, on the edge of a triangular piece of turf which represented, no doubt, a more extensive village green, now discommoned and taken in by the private dwellings scattered around.1888, William Francis Barry, The New Antigone: A Romance, page 53
   • […]acres had already been discommoned – that is, they were no longer available to tenants, cottagers and freeholders[…]2003, Alan Crosby, A History of Woking, page 73
3. To exclude from using a commonable resource, such as land.
   • I know we may by way of admonition, before hand, tell them of the danger, and by way of perswasion presse them better to prepare themselves: but wee may not for their sakes discommon our selves from the table of the Lord .1639, Robert Abbot, A Triall of our Church-forsakers, page 117
   • Whiles thou discommonest thy neighbours keyne, And warn'st that none feed on thy field saue thine;."1825, Joseph Hall, Virgidemiarum: Satires, page 91
4. (UK, historical, transitive, Oxford and Cambridge universities) To deprive of the right to deal with undergraduates.
   • […] persons violating the above statute are liable to a fine for the first offence, and to be discommoned for the second.1851, Oxford University Statutes: The University statutes, from 1767 to 1850
   • It could 'discommon' any citizen (most of whom, the Laudian statutes grumbled, 'catch at every occasion of impugning the University privileges') or privileged person should they 'oppose the University privileges'; for a privileged person this meant a suspension of privileges and for a citizen an...2013, Ian Gadd, Ian Anders Gadd, Simon Eliot, History of Oxford University Press, page 559

   Synonyms:

   discommons