Now rare. Also 7 vessail(e, -ayl, -all. [f. prec.]
1. trans. To make subject or subordinate to some thing or person.
1613. Drumm. of Hawth., Cypress Grove, Wks. 1913, II. 98. Celestiall thinges fauour him, earthly thinges are vassaled vnto him.
1615. G. Sandys, Trav., 77. Whose posterity in part remaineth to this day, though vassaled to the often changes of forraine Governours.
1628. Feltham, Resolves, II. lxxi. 205. It vassailes him to the world, to beasts, and men.
refl. 1622. Wither, Philarete (1633), H xii. Lovers … Vassaling themselves with shame To some proud imperious Dame.
1652–62. Heylin, Cosmogr. (1682), III. 209. The other nine … have vassalled themselves to the great Mongul.
2. To reduce to the position of a vassal; to subdue or subjugate. Also fig.
1612. W. Parkes, Curtaine-Dr. (1876), 17. The rules of reason, and the lawes of nature,… vassayled, obliterate and vnregarded by him.
1621. Bp. Mountagu, Diatribæ, 493. For Crœsus King of Lydia … was vanquished … and vassalled by Cyrus of Persia.
a. 1653. G. Daniel, Idyll, Illustr. 5. And fellow-Creatures vassail’d, tumble downe To either Face or Hand, the Axe, or Crowne.
Hence Vassalled ppl. a.
1606. Warner, Alb. Eng., XIV. lxxx. (1612), 338. And oft his vassalde English he gainst forraine Swords did bring.
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., cccii. The Vassail’d Earth was rent, vnder his Rule.
1815. J. C. Hobhouse, Substance Lett. (1816), I. 102. To restore the kings … of that ancient, oppressed, vassalled, decimated France.
