vacate

Originally used in the legal sense "to annul", a denominal from Early Modern English vacat (“legal annulment”), a development from Middle English vacat (“absence or cancellation noted in a register”), from Latin vacat, third-person singular present active indicative of vacō (“to be idle; to be unoccupied”, literally “to be empty”).

The primary modern sense "to move out" likely developed under the influence of older borrowing vacant (“unoccupied”), in combination with the Early Modern use of vacate to refer to the termination of official appointments to office, which would leave those position vacant.

• IPA^(key): /veɪˈkeɪt/, /ˈveɪ.keɪt/, (uncommon) /vəˈkeɪt/

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -eɪt

vacate (third-person singular simple present vacates, present participle vacating, simple past and past participle vacated)

1. To move out of a dwelling or other property, either by choice or by eviction.

   I have to vacate my house by midday, as the new owner is moving in.

   You are hereby ordered to vacate the premises within 14 days.

   • 2023 November 29, Philip Haigh, “New Piccadilly Line trains put to the test”, in RAIL, number 997, page 26:

     The dynamic tests at Wildenrath use continuous test tracks built on the site of a former Royal Air Force station that was vacated after the end of the Cold War.

2. To leave an office or position.

   He vacated his coaching position because of the corruption scandal.

3. (law, transitive) To have a court judgement set aside; to annul.

   The judge vacated the earlier decision when new evidence was presented.

   • 2024 April 27, Maya Yang, “Disgraced former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein hospitalized”, in The Observer‎^[1], →ISSN:

     On Thursday, the New York court of appeals vacated his conviction after concluding that a trial judge permitted jurors to see and hear too much evidence not directly related to the charges he faced. It also erased his 23-year prison sentence and ordered a retrial.

4. To leave an area, usually as a result of orders from public authorities in the event of a riot or natural disaster.

   If you do not immediately vacate the area, we will make you leave with tear gas!

• vacant
• vacation
• evacuate

• caveat

vacate

1. inflection of vacare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

vacate f pl

1. feminine plural of vacato

• cavate, taceva

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [waˈkaː.tɛ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [vaˈkaː.t̪e]

vacāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of vacō

vacate

1. second-person singular voseo imperative of vacar combined with te