apprentice, verb transitive
- Origin:
- As apprentice noun.
historical
To register (someone, often a former slave or the child of a slave) as the indentured servant of a particular master for a fixed period; book; inboek.
1816 G. Barker Journal. 25 Jan.A Hottentot woman..had resided a long time with a certain Boor and had cohabited with a slave of his, by whom she had several children; the Boor had driven her away & deprived her of the man with whom she had so long lived that he might take a slave woman to wife, that the Boor might gain slaves, (the children of the Hottentot being free) her children were detained by the Boor & apprenticed after the usual manner.
1980 J. Cock Maids & Madams 175San women and children were captured by both Xhosa and Dutch farmers who wanted servants. San adults sometimes ‘apprenticed’ their children to Dutch farmers when they were ‘in a famished state’.
- Derivatives:
- Hence apprenticing verbal noun.1904 H.A. Bryden Hist. of S. Afr. 279A large number of Bechuanas were deported to Cape Colony proper, where they were ‘apprenticed’ among Dutch farmers. This deportation and forcible apprenticing..is little better than a form of slavery.