ppl. a. [UN-1 8. Cf. OE. unʓewǽpnod, MDu. ongewapent (Du. -wapend), MHG. ungewâfent, -wâpent (G. ungewaffnet, -wappnet).] Not equipped with or bearing a weapon or weapons; unarmed.
c. 1200. Trin. Coll. Hom., 191. Ðus flitð þe fiend wið alle men;… and þo ben alle unwepnede þe ne hauen mid hwan hie hem werien.
c. 1205. Lay., 5654. Þeo cnihtes weoren vnwepned, Þa þe wæne heo wes ȝeueðe.
c. 1425. Eng. Conq. Irel., 22. So as we bene … well y-wepned,… ne dout no man þat such vnwepned rascayll any power haw ows to wythstond.
1513–4. Act 5 Hen. VIII., c. 6. Wheras they [sc. surgeons] … have ben entreatid as Herawdes of Armes aswell in batelles and feldes as other places ther for to stond unharnesed and unwapenned.
1553. Bale, Vocacyon, 28 b. The cruell murtherers … cowardly slewe them all vnarmed & vnweaponed.
a. 1618. Raleigh, Disc. War (1850), 2. Instruments of much advantage against unweaponed men.
1642. Vicars, God in Mount, 66. Being all unweaponed, and coming onely in a fair and unoffensive manner.
1823. Monthly Mag., LV. 409. He hastes his armour off to throw, And stands unweapon’d.
1874. Spurgeon, Treas. Dav., IV. 371. Not by the aid of others, but by his own unweaponed hand his marvellous conquests have been achieved.
fig. 1549. Coverdale, etc., Erasm. Par. 2 Cor., 57 b. As lowe and weake as ye thinke vs, yet are we not vnweaponed, nor without strength to suppresse the aduersaries of the gospel.
1594. Marlowe & Nashe, Dido, I. ii. Our hands are not prepar’d to lawles spoyle…: Such force is farre from our vnweaponed thoughts.
1624. Massinger, Bondman, IV. iv. Hee’s more a slaue, then Fortune Or Miserie can make me, that insults Vpon vnweapon’d Innocence.
a. 1628. F. Grevil, Cælica, xx. Since unweaponed care makes men forlorne, Let me first make your Dogge an Vnicorne.
1859. G. Wilson, Mem. E. Forbes, iv. (1861), 131. An accuracy [with the stethoscope] … such as the experience of forty years had often failed to bring to the unweaponed physician.
