Skip to content
HOW TO PRONOUNCE

abdicate

/ˈæbdəˌkeɪt/

Press play to hear how to pronounce abdicate.

American Pronunciation Guide · 1:05
Watch on YouTube ↗

What does abdicate mean?

verb

  1. To surrender, renounce or relinquish, as sovereign power; to withdraw definitely from filling or exercising, as a high office, station, dignity; to fail to fulfill responsibility for.
  2. To relinquish or renounce a throne, or other high office or dignity; to renounce sovereignty.
More meanings (4)

verb

  1. (obsolete) To disclaim and expel from the family, as a father his child; to disown; to disinherit.
  2. (obsolete) To formally separate oneself from or to divest oneself of.
  3. (obsolete) To depose.
  4. (obsolete) To reject; to cast off; to discard.

Definitions regrouped for readability · CC BY-SA 4.0

IPA pronunciation

/ˈæbdəˌkeɪt/

CMU Pronouncing Dictionary

Pronunciation varies by speaker and region. About these dictionary pronunciations.

In the pages of books

See this word in context.

To ignore the directive influence of this present environment upon the young is simply to abdicate the educational function.
John DeweyDemocracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of EducationProject Gutenberg ebook #852
As you are both Republicans, and hold kings in detestation, of course you'll abdicate at once.
Arthur Sullivan; W. S. (William Schwenck) GilbertThe Complete Plays of Gilbert and SullivanProject Gutenberg ebook #808
More book examples (3)
But the bourgeois of the epoch of la Minerve estimated so highly that poor de, that they thought themselves bound to abdicate it.
Victor HugoLes MisérablesTranslated by Isabel Florence HapgoodProject Gutenberg ebook #135
An elderly chief will sometimes voluntarily abdicate in favour of a son.
Charles Hose; William McDougallThe Pagan Tribes of Borneo A Description of Their Physical Moral and Intellectual Condition, with Some Discussion of Their Ethnic RelationsProject Gutenberg ebook #3307
In that sad half-hour among the Italian olives there had been such a fierce sincerity in his tone, that Rowland began to abdicate the critical attitude.
Henry JamesRoderick HudsonProject Gutenberg ebook #176