English Dictionary |
KIDNAPPING
Pronunciation (US): | (GB): |
IPA (US): |
Dictionary entry overview: What does kidnapping mean?
• KIDNAPPING (noun)
The noun KIDNAPPING has 1 sense:
1. (law) the unlawful act of capturing and carrying away a person against their will and holding them in false imprisonment
Familiarity information: KIDNAPPING used as a noun is very rare.
Dictionary entry details
Sense 1
Meaning:
(law) the unlawful act of capturing and carrying away a person against their will and holding them in false imprisonment
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Synonyms:
kidnapping; snatch
Hypernyms ("kidnapping" is a kind of...):
capture; seizure (the act of taking of a person by force)
Domain category:
jurisprudence; law (the collection of rules imposed by authority)
Derivation:
kidnap (take away to an undisclosed location against their will and usually in order to extract a ransom)
Context examples
Kidnapping a German subject. And stealing his private papers.
(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
I sat in silence wondering what on earth could be his reason for kidnapping me in this extraordinary fashion.
(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Here I walked about for a long time, feeling very strange, and mortally apprehensive of some one coming in and kidnapping me; for I believed in kidnappers, their exploits having frequently figured in Bessie's fireside chronicles.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
The police imagine, I take it, that this Fitzroy Simpson, having drugged the lad, and having in some way obtained a duplicate key, opened the stable door and took out the horse, with the intention, apparently, of kidnapping him altogether.
(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Learn English with... Proverbs |
"Can you live with the heart of a rabbit?" (Albanian proverb)
"An unshod mocks a shoe." (Arabic proverb)
"A horse aged thirty: don't add any more years." (Corsican proverb)