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The vest in divest is a close relation of the kind found in closets—its origin is Latin vestis meaning “clothing, garment.” (Vest has the same source and first appeared in English as a verb in the 15th century meaning “to put on garments or vestments.”) Divest today mostly appears in legal and business contexts about a formal removal or loss of something of value; assets that are divested are sold or given away; someone divested of a right officially loses that right. The word’s first late 16th century use, however, was more intimately related to its roots: divest was then used to mean “to undress or strip especially of clothing, ornament, or equipment.” But broader application of divest soon followed. In Shakespeare’s Henry V, the French King Charles is told via messenger that England’s King Henry “wills you, in the name of God Almighty, / That you divest yourself, and lay apart / ... the crown / And all wide-stretched honours that pertain ...”
Examples of divest in a Sentence
Tamara Keith, NPR, 22 Feb. 2025
The TikTok ban is not being enforced by President Donald Trump’s administration, but owner ByteDance is still under pressure to divest its US operations.
—Simon Hill, WIRED, 21 Feb. 2025
Tiktok briefly went dark last month as the deadline to divest the app was set to lapse, but was restored hours later.
—Richard Nieva, Forbes, 21 Feb. 2025
Last year the student government passed a resolution calling on the university to divest from Boeing, citing its ties to Israel.
—Andrew Lapin, Sun Sentinel, 20 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for divest
Cite this Entry
“Divest.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/divest. Accessed 3 Mar. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
divest
verb
Legal Definition
divest
transitive verb
Anglo-French devestir, literally, to undress, from Old French desvestir, from de(s)-, prefix marking reversal + vestir to dress, from Latin vestire
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