Liberate Meaning

/ˈlɪbəɹeɪt/
C1

Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.

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verbTo set free, to make or allow to be free, particularly

verbOften followed by from: to allow or cause (someone or something) to be free; to set free, to release.

We must liberate them.
We must liberate her.
Work doesn't liberate, it eventually makes you tired.
Synonyms:
Antonyms:
CEFR Practice Quiz
The rebels fought to ____ the prisoners from the dictator's jails.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The main goal of the movement was to ____ the oppressed people from the rule of the powerful dictator today.

Learned borrowing from Latin līberātus (“freed, liberated; absolved, acquitted; released”); see English -ate (suffix forming verbs, and used as the ending of participial adjectives and obsolete past participles from Latin). Līberātus is the perfect passive participle of līberō (“to free, liberate; to absolve, acquit; to release”), from līber (“free, unrestricted”), + -ō (suffix forming regular first-conjugation verbs); and līberō is ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₁léwdʰeros (“free”), from *h₁lewdʰ- (“to grow; people”) + *-teros (contrastive or oppositional adjectival suffix) (*h₁léwdʰeros possibly originally meant ‘belonging to one’s own people’, excluding slaves who were captured from other groups of people, and thus later came to mean “free (not enslaved)”). Not related to deliberate.

"Thus ſitting and ſurveying thus at eaſe / The globe and its concerns, I ſeem advanced / To ſome ſecure and more than mortal height, / That lib'rates and exempts me from them all." — 1785, William Cowper, “Book IV. The Winter Evening.”, in The Task, a Poem, […], London: […] J[oseph] Johnson; […], →OCLC, page 142:
"[T]he prisoner being liberate in manner foresaid, it shall not be lawful to put or detain him in prison for the same crime, under the penalty of wrongous imprisonment, […]" — 1828, James Watson, “Wrongous Imprisonment”, in A Practical View of the Statute Law of Scotland, from the Year MCCCCXXIV to the Close of the Session of Parliament MDCCCXXVII, […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] [James Walker] for Bell & Bradfute, and Thomas M. Shiells, →OCLC, page 415:
"This is not a time for telling stories, when I am in this prison; but when thou liberatest me, I will relate to thee their case." — 1839, “Chapter II. Continuation of the Story of the Fisherman.”, in Edward William Lane, transl., The Thousand and One Nights, Commonly Called, in England, the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments. […], volume I, London: Charles Knight and Co. […], →OCLC, page 97:
"Walking slow to beating bosom surest solace soonest gives, / Liberates the brain o'erloaded—best of all restoratives." — 1877 September 14, Robert Browning, “La Saisiaz”, in La Saisiaz: The Two Poets of Croisic, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], published 1878, →OCLC, page 52:
"The Doctrine [of the Bardo Thödol] is one which liberateth by being seen, without need of meditation or of sādhanā [perfected devotion]; this Profound Teaching liberateth by being heard or being seen. This Profound Teaching liberateth those of great evil karma through the Secret Pathway." — 1927, [Karma Lingpa], “[The General Conclusion]”, in Kazi Dawa-Samdup, transl., edited by W[alter] Y[eeling] Evans-Wentz, The Tibetan Book of the Dead: Or The After-death Experiences on the Bardo Plane, According to Lāma Kazi Dawa-Samdup’s English Rendering, London: Oxford University Press; Humphrey Milford, →OCLC, book II (The Sidpa Bardo), part II (The Process of Rebirth), page 196:

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CEFR Practice Quiz
The rebels fought to ____ the prisoners from the dictator's jails.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The main goal of the movement was to ____ the oppressed people from the rule of the powerful dictator today.

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