confiscate
pronunciation
How to pronounce confiscate in British English:
UK [ˈkɒnfɪskeɪt]
How to pronounce confiscate in American English:
US [ˈkɑːnfɪskeɪt]
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- Verb:
- take temporary possession of as a security, by legal authority
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- Adjective:
- surrendered as a penalty
- taken without permission or consent especially by public authority
Word Origin
- confiscate
- confiscate: [16] Confiscate’s etymological connotations are financial: the Latin verb confīscāre meant ‘appropriate to the public treasury’. It was formed from the collective prefix com- and fiscus. This meant originally ‘rush-basket’; it was applied to the baskets used by tax collectors, and hence came to mean ‘public treasury’ (English gets fiscal from it). The looser sense of confiscate, ‘seize by authority’, dates from the early 19th century.=> fiscal
- confiscate (v.)
- 1550s, originally, "to appropriate for the treasury," from Latin confiscatus, past participle of confiscare, from com- "together" (see com-) + fiscus "public treasury," literally "money basket" (see fiscal). Related: Confiscated; confiscating.
Example
- 1. The customs officer would confiscate the tv and miss the rest .
- 2. The republic would , he said , " take certain necessary steps " to confiscate land from rural landlords .
- 3. Israeli soldiers confiscate flocks that stray .
- 4. This month , armed federal agents stormed into his house and offices to confiscate plants and documents .
- 5. In the summer of 2007 , authorities raided neighbourhoods all over tehran to confiscate illegal satellite dishes .