imbolden

imbolden (third-person singular simple present imboldens, present participle imboldening, simple past and past participle imboldened)

1. Obsolete spelling of embolden.
   • 1600 or 1601 (date written), I. M. [i.e., John Marston], Antonios Reuenge. The Second Part. […], London: […] [Richard Bradock] for Thomas Fisher, and are to be soulde [by Matthew Lownes] […], published 1602, →OCLC, Act V, scene iii, signatures I4, recto – I4, verso:

     Steel your thoughts, ſharp your reſolue, imboldẽ your spirit, graſp your ſvvords; alarum miſchief, & vvith an vndãted brovv, out ſcout the grim oppoſition of most menacing perill.

   • 1626, Ovid, “The Tenth Booke”, in George Sandys, transl., Ovid’s Metamorphosis Englished […], London: […] William Stansby, →OCLC, page 201:

     Their lookes imboldned, modeſtie novv gone, / Conuert at length to little-differing Stone.

   • 1742, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter XXXII. The Journal Continued.”, in Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded. […], volume III, London: […] S[amuel] Richardson; and sold by C[harles] Rivington, […]; and J. Osborn, […], →OCLC, page 231:

     I have called myſelf to Account upon it, vvhether any Levity in my Looks, my Dreſs, my Appearance, could imbolden ſuch an affrontive Inſolence.

• “imbolden”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.