RENOUNCE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does renounce mean? 

• RENOUNCE (verb)
  The verb RENOUNCE has 4 senses:

1. give up, such as power, as of monarchs and emperors, or duties and obligations

2. leave (a job, post, or position) voluntarily

3. turn away from; give up

4. cast off

  Familiarity information: RENOUNCE used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• RENOUNCE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they renounce    ... he / she / it renounces   
Past simple: renounced   
Past participle: renounced   
-ing form: renouncing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Give up, such as power, as of monarchs and emperors, or duties and obligations

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Synonyms:

abdicate; renounce

Context example:

The King abdicated when he married a divorcee

Hypernyms (to "renounce" is one way to...):

give up; renounce; resign; vacate (leave (a job, post, or position) voluntarily)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

renouncement (an act (spoken or written) declaring that something is surrendered or disowned)

renunciation (the act of renouncing; sacrificing or giving up or surrendering (a possession or right or title or privilege etc.))

renunciation (an act (spoken or written) declaring that something is surrendered or disowned)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Leave (a job, post, or position) voluntarily

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Synonyms:

give up; renounce; resign; vacate

Context example:

The chairman resigned when he was found to have misappropriated funds

Hypernyms (to "renounce" is one way to...):

leave office; quit; resign; step down (give up or retire from a position)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "renounce"):

abdicate; renounce (give up, such as power, as of monarchs and emperors, or duties and obligations)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Turn away from; give up

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Synonyms:

foreswear; quit; relinquish; renounce

Context example:

I am foreswearing women forever

Hypernyms (to "renounce" is one way to...):

abandon; give up (give up with the intent of never claiming again)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "renounce"):

disclaim (renounce a legal claim or title to)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

renunciant (used especially of behavior)

renunciation (an act (spoken or written) declaring that something is surrendered or disowned)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Cast off

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

disown; renounce; repudiate

Context example:

The parents repudiated their son

Hypernyms (to "renounce" is one way to...):

reject (refuse to accept or acknowledge)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "renounce"):

apostatise; apostatize; tergiversate (abandon one's beliefs or allegiances)

abjure; forswear; recant; resile; retract (formally reject or disavow a formerly held belief, usually under pressure)

swallow; take back; unsay; withdraw (take back what one has said)

rebut; refute (overthrow by argument, evidence, or proof)

deny (refuse to accept or believe)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

renouncement (an act (spoken or written) declaring that something is surrendered or disowned)

renunciation (rejecting or disowning or disclaiming as invalid)

 Context examples 

Already he had learned to bless his father for that wise provision which had made him seek to know the world ere he had ventured to renounce it.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Yet I cannot ask you to renounce your country and friends to fulfil this task; and now that you are returning to England, you will have little chance of meeting with him.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

You own the name and renounce the alias?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

How very few of those men in a rank of life to address Emma would have renounced their own home for Hartfield!

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

She married me in opposition to her father's wish, and he renounced her.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

But I do not remember I gave you power to consent that any thing should be omitted, and much less that any thing should be inserted; therefore, as to the latter, I do here renounce every thing of that kind; particularly a paragraph about her majesty Queen Anne, of most pious and glorious memory; although I did reverence and esteem her more than any of human species.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

I'll try, Beth. and then and there Jo renounced her old ambition, pledged herself to a new and better one, acknowledging the poverty of other desires, and feeling the blessed solace of a belief in the immortality of love.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

I thought it my duty, said he, independent of my feelings, to give her the option of continuing the engagement or not, when I was renounced by my mother, and stood to all appearance without a friend in the world to assist me.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

He could not—he would not—renounce his wild field of mission warfare for the parlours and the peace of Vale Hall.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I don't remember much about it, except that I was afraid of the cellar and the dark entry, and always liked the cake and milk we had up at the top. If I wasn't too old for such things, I'd rather like to play it over again, said Amy, who began to talk of renouncing childish things at the mature age of twelve.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)