quit

• quight (obsolete)

• enPR: kwĭt, IPA^(key): /kwɪt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪt

From Middle English quiten, quyten, from Anglo-Norman quitter, Old French quitter, from quitte (“acquited, quit”), ultimately from Latin quietus.

Compare Dutch kwijten (“to quit”), Low German quitten (“to quit”), German quitten, quittieren, Danish kvitte, Swedish qvitta, kvitta (“to quit, leave, set off”), Icelandic kvitta.

quit (third-person singular simple present quits, present participle quitting, simple past and past participle quit or quitted)

1. (transitive, archaic) To pay (a debt, fine etc.).
   • (Can we date this quote?)William Shakespeare

     Enkindle all the sparks of nature / To quit this horrid act.

   • (Can we date this quote?)Edward Fairfax

     that judge that quits each soul his hire

2. (transitive, obsolete) To repay (someone) for (something).
   • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter xiv, in Le Morte Darthur, book II:

     I was but late att a Iustynge / and there I Iusted with a knyghte that is broder vnto kynge Pellam / and twyes smote I hym doune / & thenne he promysed to quyte me on my best frynde / and so he wounded my sone that can not be hole tyll I haue of that knyghtes blood

3. (transitive, obsolete) To repay, pay back (a good deed, injury etc.).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.v:

     Vnthankfull wretch (said he) is this the meed, / With which her soueraigne mercy thou doest quight?

   • 1613, John Marston, William Barksted, The Insatiate Countess, III.2:

     Forgive me, Rogero: 'tis my fate / To love thy friend and quit thy love with hate.

4. (reflexive, archaic) To conduct or acquit (oneself); to behave (in a specified way).
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), imprinted at London: By Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, 1 Samuel 4:9:

     Be strong and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you: quit yourselves like men, and fight.

   • (Can we date this quote?)John Milton

     Samson hath quit himself like Samson.

5. (transitive, archaic) To carry through; to go through to the end.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Samuel Daniel

     Never worthy prince a day did quit / With greater hazard and with more renown.

6. (transitive) To set at rest; to free, as from anything harmful or oppressive; to relieve; to clear; to liberate.
   • (Can we date this quote?) William Wake

     To quit you of this fear, you have already looked Death in the face; what have you found so terrible in it?

7. (transitive) To release from obligation, accusation, penalty, etc.; to absolve; to acquit.
   • (Can we date this quote?) John Milton

     God will relent, and quit thee all his debt.

8. (transitive) To abandon, renounce (a thing).
9. (transitive) To leave (a place).
   • 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling. In Six Volumes, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: Printed by A[ndrew] Millar, […], OCLC 928184292:

     Jones had no sooner quitted the room, than the petty-fogger, in a whispering tone, asked Mrs Whitefield, “If she knew who that fine spark was?”

10. (transitive, intransitive) To resign from (a job, office, position, etc.).

    After having to work overtime without being paid, I quit my job.

11. (transitive, intransitive) To stop, give up (an activity) (usually + gerund or verbal noun).

    John is planning to quit smoking.

12. (transitive, computing) To close (an application).

quit (not comparable)

1. (usually followed by of) released from obligation, penalty, etc; free, clear, or rid.
   • 1990, Claude de Bèze, 1688 revolution in Siam: the memoir of Father de Bèze, s.j, translated by E. W. Hutchinson, University Press, page 153:

     With mounting anger the King denounced the pair, both father and son, and was about to condemn them to death when his strength gave out. Faint and trembling he was unable to walk and the sword fell from his hands as he murmured: 'May the Protector of the Buddhist Faith grant me but seven more days grace of life to be quit of this disloyal couple, father and son'.

• The past tense of quit is now quit for most speakers and writers; dictionaries usually allow quitted as an alternative, but it is rare or nonexistent in North America and Australia, and outnumbered by quit by about 16 to 1 in the British National Corpus. Quitted is more commonly used to mean “left”. e.g., She quitted her job.

• For quotations of use of this term, see Citations:quit.

• quitter

Pam Peters, The Cambridge Guide to English Usage, Cambridge University Press, p. 453.

Origin uncertain.

quit (plural quits)

1. Any of numerous species of small passerine birds native to tropical America. [from 19th c.]

• bananaquit
• grassquit
• orangequit

• guitguit

quit

1. third-person singular past historic of quérir

quit

1. third-person singular present active indicative of queō

quit

1. first-person singular present indicative of quidier