arrogate

American  

[ar-uh-geyt] / ˈær əˌgeɪt /

verb (used with object)

• arrogates,
  present (3rd person singular)
• arrogated,
  past participle,  past
• arrogating
  present participle

1. to claim unwarrantably or presumptuously; assume or appropriate to oneself without right.

   to arrogate the right to make decisions.

2. to attribute or assign to another; ascribe.

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arrogate British  

/ əˈrɒɡətɪv, ˈærəˌɡeɪt /

verb

1. (tr) to claim or appropriate for oneself presumptuously or without justification

2. (tr) to attribute or assign to another without justification

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• arrogation
  noun
• arrogator
  noun
• arrogative
  adjective
• unarrogated
  adjective
• unarrogating
  adjective
• arrogatingly
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Participles

• arrogating
  present
• arrogated
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• arrogate
  simple
• arrogates
  simple
• have arrogated
  perfect
• has arrogated
  perfect
• am arrogating
  progressive
• are arrogating
  progressive
• is arrogating
  progressive
• have been arrogating
  perfect progressive
• has been arrogating
  perfect progressive

Past

• arrogated
  simple
• had arrogated
  perfect
• was arrogating
  progressive
• were arrogating
  progressive
• had been arrogating
  perfect progressive

Future

• will arrogate
  simple
• will have arrogated
  perfect
• will be arrogating
  progressive
• will have been arrogating
  perfect progressive

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.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

arrogate arrogates arrogated arrogating

“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

But she became annoyed when the overbearing chief of staff seemed to arrogate presidential decision-making responsibilities to himself during Reagan's convalescence from cancer surgery in 1985.

From Time Magazine Archive

The future, really, now, the very immediate future, must be flung to chance; it was hopeless to arrogate to her forethought the determination of it; besides, here was New York already.

From The Early Life and Adventures of Sylvia Scarlett by Compton MacKenzie

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

The ablest writers have maintained that society has not the right of life and death, and whoever arrogates that power commits a “divine lèse majesté.”

From Martyria or Andersonville Prison by Augustus C. Hamlin

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

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

“Yet in this case, Congress arrogated that power to itself.”

From Washington Post ● Apr. 20, 2016

One result of this humiliating and disastrous war was the strengthening of the hands of the anti-Orange burgher-regents, who had now arrogated to themselves the name of “patriots.”

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 13, Slice 5 "Hinduism" to "Home, Earls of" by Various

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

He declaimed strongly against man's arrogating to himself the authority to deprive his fellow-beings of their human and spiritual rights.

From The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery by Nicolas Notovitch

So Maurice Mangan was arrogating to himself, was he, the right of guessing Francie's preferences?

From Prince Fortunatus by William Black

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