Literary notes about Consign (AI summary)
In literature, the word "consign" has been employed with a rich variety of meanings, ranging from the physical act of sending something away to the more abstract idea of destiny or assignment. For example, in ancient texts like Homer's works, "consign" is used to denote entrusting valuable qualities or objects—as seen in consigning a daughter's charms or a prized object to another's care ([1], [2], [3]). In other instances, authors extend its meaning to the realm of fate and neglect, such as consigning actions or results to chance or oblivion, as illustrated by Verne and Livy ([4], [5], [6]). Meanwhile, writers like Whitman and Emerson employ the term metaphorically to dedicate ideas or institutions, assigning them to broader social or moral frameworks ([7], [8]). Even in contexts involving responsibility or punishment, as noted in Milton and Stevenson, "consign" implies the transfer of duty or blame, thereby demonstrating its versatility in setting both concrete and figurative matters in motion ([9], [10]). Thus, across centuries, this term has evolved to encapsulate a spectrum of meanings from the physical to the ideological.
- When the kind sire consign'd his daughter's charms (Theano's sister) to his youthful arms.
— from The Iliad by Homer - (Their grandsire's wealth, by right of birth their own, Consign'd his daughter with Lelegia's throne:)
— from The Iliad by Homer - But when old age had dimm'd Lycurgus' eyes, To Ereuthalion he consign'd the prize.
— from The Iliad by Homer - If you want to consign people to oblivion, you don't light up their dungeons.
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas: An Underwater Tour of the World by Jules Verne - why did they not engage them in the field, and consign the result to fortune to be determined at once?
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy - What of the other things, all of which we transact under auspices within the Pomærium, to what oblivion, to what neglect do we consign them?
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy - It must be consign'd henceforth to democracy en masse , and to literature.
— from Complete Prose Works by Walt Whitman - Still to ourselves in every place consign'd, Our own felicity we make or find."
— from Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson by Ralph Waldo Emerson - That LOUIS-PHILIPPE, the Just of Spain, can consign his fellow-conspirator,
— from Paradise Lost by John Milton - If I sought to enter by the house, my own servants would consign me to the gallows.
— from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson