[f. LEAGUE sb.2 Cf. F. liguer, It. legare.]
1. trans. To form or join into a league; to band together with; to confederate.
1611. Cotgr., Ligué, leagued, in league with.
1633. P. Fletcher, Pisc. Eclogs, etc. Upon Picture Achmet, Wakeful ambition leagu’d with hastie pride.
1638. Drumm. of Hawth., Irene, Wks. (1711), 166. To league a people is to make them know their strength & power.
1648. Hamilton Papers (Camden), 219. France, Jermin, and the Parliament of England, are leagued to obstruct his designe.
1667. Milton, P. L., X. 868. Out of my sight, thou Serpent, that name best Befits thee with him leagu’d.
1791. Cowper, Iliad, XII. 21. Then Neptune, with Apollo leagued, devised Its ruin.
1814. Wordsw., White Doe, II. 32. Two Earls fast leagued in discontent.
1874. Green, Short Hist., v. § 6. 259. Hotspur … leagued himself with the Scots.
† 2. To bind, connect, join. Obs.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett. (1650), I. 51. They began to build upon those small islands … and in tract of time they conjoined and leagued them together by bridges.
1660. trans. Amyraldus’ Treat. conc. Relig., III. i. 304. The tyes that ligue us to God.
3. intr. To join in or form a league or alliance; to band together. Also to league against in indirect pass.
1638. Drumm. of Hawth., Irene, Wks. (1711), 166. All the world seeth, that to league is imperiously to command their king and sovereign to cut short his pinions.
1698. Crowne, Caligula, V. Dram. Wks. 1874, IV. 416. I never knew they leagu’d or lov’d till now.
1724. De Foe, Mem. Cavalier (1840), 37. The king … began to see himself leagued against … both by protestant and papist.
1813. Shelley, Q. Mab, VIII. 185. Where kings first leagued against the rights of men. Ibid. (1822), Hellas, 537. The tiger leagues not with the stag at bay Against the hunter.
1854. Milman, Lat. Chr., III. iii. (1864), I. 402. Theodoric … left the Bishop of Rome … to league with the rebellious subjects of Byzantium against the Eastern Emperor.
Hence Leagued ppl. a., confederate; Leaguing vbl. sb.
1799. Campbell, Pleas. Hope, I. 351. When leagu’d Oppression pour’d to Northern wars Her whisker’d pandoors and her fierce hussars.
1807. Crabbe, Library, 136. Where first the proud, the great, In leagued assembly keep their cumbrous state.
1817. Shelley, Rev. Islam, II. xiv. A tower whose marbled walls the leagued storms withstand!
1821. Joanna Baillie, Metr. Leg., Wallace, xxvii. These are the leagued for Scotland’s native right.
1840. Dickens, Barn. Rudge, xxxvi. They can sustain no harm from leaguing for this purpose.
1845. Sarah Austin, Ranke’s Hist. Ref., III. 499. The leagued states.
1869. Daily News, 8 March, 2/1. The invasion of France was almost necessitated by the continual menaces of the French King, and his actual leaguing with the Scots against the independence of England.
