English

Etymology

Noun

1. The act of dismembering.
   • 1911, R. Austin Freeman, The Vanishing Man, ch 13,

     The skill is shown by the neat way in which the dismemberment has been carried out. The parts have not been rudely hacked asunder, but have been separated at the joints.

   • 1986, Lewis Binford et al., "Zhoukoudian: A Closer Look," Current Anthropology, vol. 27, no. 5., p. 460,

     The metapodials appear to have been marked during dismemberment from the lower limbs.

2. The state or condition of being dismembered.
   • 1831, Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus, ch. 11,

     Is not the fair fabric of Society itself, with all its royal mantles and pontifical stoles, whereby, from nakedness and dismemberment, we are organized into Polities, into nations, and a whole co-operating Mankind, the creation, as has here been often irrefragably evinced, of the Tailor alone?

3. Removal from membership; detachment from an organization, group, etc.
   • 1867, "Supreme Court of the District of Columbia. Ex Parte Magruder," The American Law Register (1852-1891), vol. 15, no. 5, New Series Volume 6, (Mar.), p. 295,

     The decision of the Supreme Court involved a dismemberment from the bar.

   • 1946, William Platt, "Studies in War-Time Organisation: (6) East African Command," African Affairs, vol. 45, no. 178, p. 27,

     As the Italian East African Empire was on the verge of extinction in the autumn of 1941, East African Command was created by dismemberment from Middle East.

References

• Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., 1989.

See also

• Decapitation