unpeople

unpeople

English

Etymology

un- +‎ people

Noun

unpeople

1. plural of unperson

Verb

unpeople (third-person singular simple present unpeoples, present participle unpeopling, simple past and past participle unpeopled)

1. (transitive) To deprive of inhabitants; to depopulate.
   • 1598, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra, I. v. 78:

     He shall have every day a several greeting, / Or I'll unpeople Egypt.

   • 1604, William Shakespeare, Measure, for Measure, III. ii. 164:

     This / ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with / continency.

   • 1785, William Cowper, “The Garden”, in The Task, a Poem, in Six Books. By William Cowper [...] To which are Added, by the Same Author, An Epistle to Joseph Hill, Esq. Tirocinium, or a Review of Schools, and The History of John Gilpin, London: Printed for J[oseph] Johnson, No. 72 St. Paul's Church-Yard, OCLC 221351486; republished as The Task. A Poem. In Six Books. To which is Added, Tirocinium: or, A Review of Schools, new edition, Philadelphia, Pa.: Printed for Thomas Dobson, bookseller, in Second-street, second door above Chestnut-street, 1787, OCLC 23630717, page 87:

     'Tis the cruel gripe, / That lean hard-handed poverty inflicts, / The hope of better things, the chance to win, / The wiſh to ſhine, the thirſt to be amus'd, / That at the found of Winter's hoary wing, / Unpeople all our counties, of ſuch herds, / Of flutt'ring, loit'ring, cringing, begging, looſe, / And wanton vagrants, as make London, vaſt / And boundless as it is, a crowded coop.