Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Present participle of imbrue.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • He thought of the knife in his belt, and how easily he could despatch the Indian in a moment as he lay; but then the idea of imbruing his hands in human blood seemed so awful that he could not bring himself to do it.

    Martin Rattler 1859

  • I thought, What if the young man who was with so much difficulty restrained from imbruing his hands in me should yield to a constitutional impatience, or should mistake the time, and should think himself accredited to my heart and liver to – night, instead of to – morrow!

    Great Expectations 2007

  • Pallas [39] and of the Titans, but imbruing altars with the shed blood of strangers, a pest unsuited to the harp, [of strangers] sighing forth [40] a piteous cry, and shedding a piteous tear.

    The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. 480? BC-406 BC Euripides

  • Dehors had the imprudence to remonstrate with those about him, dissuading them from imbruing their hands in the blood of a wretched man, when their desire was so soon to be accomplished by the minister of the law.

    The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) Henry Martyn Baird

  • Southern sections of the United States, civil war, blood-shed, the sacking and burning of cities, devastations, brother imbruing his hands in the blood of brother, the father shedding the blood of his son, and the son that of the father!

    A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin or, An Essay on Slavery A. Woodward

  • So while issuing his summons against the reformer to appear and answer the charges which had been brought against him, he did not attempt at once to restrain his personal liberty; he would rather, if he could, rid the kingdom of his presence without imbruing his hands in his blood.

    The Scottish Reformation Its Epochs, Episodes, Leaders, and Distinctive Characteristics Alexander F. Mitchell

  • Or else ... upplanted with blood ... signifies flowing in such manner with blood, as to suffer none to walk there without imbruing the soles of their feet in blood.

    The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete Anonymous

  • Or else ... upplanted with blood ... signifies flowing in such manner with blood, as to suffer none to walk there without imbruing the soles of their feet in blood.

    The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Old Testament — Part 2 Anonymous

  • Virginius, in killing his daughter, to preserve her from falling a victim to the lust of the decemvir Claudius, was guilty of the highest rashness; since he might certainly have gained the people, already irritated against the tyrant, without imbruing his hands in his own blood.

    Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World Anonymous

  • I was well aware that Lewis was thirsting for revenge; that he wished to do me a great wrong; and yet I was thankful on his account, as well as on my own, that he had been prevented from imbruing his hands in the blood of a fellow being.

    Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman Embracing a Correspondence of Several Years, While President of Wilberforce Colony, London, Canada West Austin Steward

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