usurping

Verb

usurp (third-person singular simple present usurps, present participle usurping, simple past and past participle 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
2. To take the place of someone or something else; to supplant.
   • 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...
3. (obsolete) To 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