arrogate
Americanverb (used with object)
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arrogates,
present (3rd person singular)
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arrogated,
past participle, past
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arrogating
present participle
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to claim unwarrantably or presumptuously; assume or appropriate to oneself without right.
to arrogate the right to make decisions.
-
to attribute or assign to another; ascribe.
verb
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(tr) to claim or appropriate for oneself presumptuously or without justification
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(tr) to attribute or assign to another without justification
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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arrogationnoun
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arrogatornoun
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arrogativeadjective
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unarrogatedadjective
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unarrogatingadjective
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arrogatinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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arrogatesimple
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arrogatessimple
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have arrogatedperfect
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has arrogatedperfect
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am arrogatingprogressive
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are arrogatingprogressive
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is arrogatingprogressive
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have been arrogatingperfect progressive
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has been arrogatingperfect progressive
Past
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arrogatedsimple
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had arrogatedperfect
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was arrogatingprogressive
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were arrogatingprogressive
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had been arrogatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of arrogate
1530–40; < Latin arrogātus appropriated, assumed, questioned (past participle of arrogāre ), equivalent to arrog- ( ar- ar- + rog ( āre ) to ask, propose) + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
To arrogate is to take over. When the teacher steps out of the classroom and some bossy student marches up to the front of the class and begins scolding the other kids? The student is trying to arrogate the teacher's authority. When someone takes control of something, often without permission, such as when a military general assumes the power of a country's government after getting rid of the previous leader, they arrogate power or control to themselves. Occasionally the verb arrogate means something like "assert one's right to," or take something that is deserved, but more often it implies a taking by force.
Vocabulary lists containing arrogate
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“Shortly thereafter, John embarked on a series of steps to arrogate to himself complete control over Mr. Angelos’ assets.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 10, 2022
They are truly generative, an apt term for a novel that queries a selfish inventor, his damaged creature and science’s threat to arrogate creation to itself.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 1, 2018
Judge Jackson said the action was “a stunning power for an agency to arrogate to itself” that the law did not support.
From New York Times ● Mar. 24, 2012
"No one in this country, however strong and sincere are his convictions and however honorable he may be, has the right to arrogate to himself to decide which laws are bad laws."
From Time Magazine Archive
It is easy to arrogate to yourself a claim to superior knowledge in the face of such general ignorance.
From The Count of Nideck adapted from the French of Erckmann-Chartrian by Ralph Browning Fiske
The rapid team collapse was head-spinning news not only in Australia but also among worldwide fans of cricket, a sport that arrogates to itself a particular moral sanctimony.
From New York Times ● Mar. 29, 2018
What is it that arrogates that authority to someone else?
From Time Magazine Archive
Where the Olympic Charter goes astray is on the very next page, on which the IOC arrogates for itself Supreme Authority.
From Time Magazine Archive
As such, it has been subject to attack time immemorial from every agency that fears new truth, or that arrogates to itself the exclusive possession of particular areas of truth.
From Time Magazine Archive
A man may usurp the substance of power in the most unpretending way; what he arrogates to himself he assumes with a haughty and overbearing manner.
From English Synonyms and Antonyms With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions by James Champlin Fernald
Today, we have a priest who has disbanded the pastoral council and arrogated governance to himself and his staff.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 8, 2023
After Cromwell, England became a place where lay power trumped religious authority, and Parliament ultimately arrogated the job of determining the official doctrine and liturgy of the kingdom.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 14, 2018
To Covington & Burling, the answer was clear: it lay with Congress, and, if Trump arrogated that power to himself, the firm was prepared to take on a lawsuit pro bono.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 24, 2018
He had arrogated to himself the privilege to call, and to assume the president would take his call.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 28, 2018
"But you don't see the point!" he arrogated through his tears, because I made rather less noise.
From Witching Hill by E. W. (Ernest William) Hornung
So, of course, it’s not just that he’s arrogating the piggy bank to himself.
From Slate ● Oct. 17, 2025
He’s also arrogating actual facts to himself, which makes this triply scary.
From Slate ● Oct. 17, 2025
Without arrogating to myself any special merit or credit for taking this course, I wish that all people would do the same.
From From Bondage to Liberty in Religion A Spiritual Autobiography by George T. Ashley
Do not fear the boldness or the prejudice of any supercilious and base philosophaster, who by either enviously calumniating or stealthily arrogating to himself the investigations of others seeks to snatch a most empty glory.
From On the magnet, magnetick bodies also, and on the great magnet the earth a new physiology, demonstrated by many arguments & experiments by William Gilbert
All before that time is founded on poetical embellishment, the speculations of theorists, or national vanity arrogating to itself a Trojan, a Grecian, or even a divine original.
From History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Age. Volume I by John Dunlop
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
