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In “Take the Money and Run,” a 1976 earworm by the Steve Miller Band, the singer punctuates a song about teenage bandits with the catchy refrain “Go on, take the money and run.” Granted, the song probably wouldn’t have charted had it been titled “Abscond,” but the meaning would have been the same. Abscond is a word most often used in formal writing for when someone is running and hiding from the law, often with cash or other ill-gotten gains. In legal circles it’s used specifically when someone flies like an eagle from a jurisdiction to evade the legal process, as in “absconded from parole.” The history of abscond doesn’t evade scrutiny: it comes from the Latin verb abscondere, meaning “to hide away.” (That word’s root is condere, meaning “to conceal.”) Today, whether some joker absconds by going to the country to bury some treasure or by taking a jet airliner beyond the law’s reach, they are, in essence, hiding themselves away.
Synonyms
Examples of abscond in a Sentence
Daniel Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Times, 22 Nov. 2024
But Trent’s mother is long dead — Celeste has absconded with her mother-in-law’s ashes.
—Louis Peitzman, Vulture, 7 Nov. 2024
In August, the most recent month for which the Probation Department provided figures, 402 of the 1,438 people under GPS monitoring had absconded, according to the statement.
—Matthew Ormseth, Los Angeles Times, 1 Nov. 2024
During all that, Jay absconded to Miami to record what would become his magnum opus.
—Damien Scott, Billboard, 19 Sep. 2024
See all Example Sentences for abscond 
Dictionary Entries Near abscond
Cite this Entry
“Abscond.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/abscond. Accessed 30 Nov. 2024.
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Legal Definition
abscond
intransitive verb
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