unstring

Verb

1. To remove the string or strings from.
   • Unstring the bows before storing them.
   • When he looked at her neck he was reminded of how difficult it was to unstring a turkey. - 2001, Graham Greene, Twenty-one Stories, →ISBN, page 30:
   • When you unstring the bow and it snaps right back to its unstrung profile, you probably have a nice piece of wood that's properly dry. - 2009, Stim Wilcox, The Art of Making Selfbows, →ISBN:
2. To shake the nerves of; to cause anxiety or panic in.
   • [T]he monſter, rouſed by the noiſe, ſtarted forward, preſented ſuch a viſage of horror, and raiſed ſuch a hideous roar, that the hearts of the bold were contracted, and the nerves of the valiant unſtrung. - 1769,...
   • The sight of his scared face, his starts and pallors and sudden harkenings, unstrung me […] - 1885, Robert Louis Stevenson, Olalla:
   • A fire is the only thing that unstrings me entirely, I feel so helpless to combat it. I'm afraid of snakes, but I can kill them. - 1915, Clifton Johnson, Battleground Adventures:
3. To defuse or relax.
   • In the mean time, the same, or a similar end, may be attained, in the 2d PLACE, By splitting a duty on a commodity, so as to unstring the stimulus to smuggle, while we preserve the same, or perhaps require a greater...
   • Society can unstring the tension of sublimation only by lifting the barrier completely, that is, by abandoning the idea that illicit eros must not be gratified; society does not unstring the tension by silently...
   • She took a deep, slow breath in an effort to settle her heart and unstring her muscles. - 2010, Julia Spencer-Fleming, A Fountain Filled With Blood, →ISBN:
4. To remove from a string; to release something that has been strung up or strung together.
   • "Poke a hole in the tops and bottoms of these eggs, blow out the yolks and whites, unstring the diamonds and stick them through the holes..." - 1988, Eileen Christelow, The Robbery at the Diamond Dog Diner, →ISBN:
   • Look at them for 10 seconds, and then unstring them and try to put the beads back in their right order. - 2004, Mandy Hager, Help, My Brain Hurts!:
   • After pelting unstring the carcase. - 2008, Alan Thompson, Claude Goodchild, Keeping Poultry and Rabbits on Scraps, →ISBN:
5. To untie.
   • Invaded thus, for want of better bands, His garland they unstring, and bind his hands - 1773, John Dryden, Original poems by John Dryden, Esq - Volume 5, page 69:
   • He is now e'en trying to unstring the tie of virtue, in yon poor cottager's daughter! - 1840, John N. Smith, Ramanzo: The Conscience Stricken Brigand.:
   • “So, James, should we unstring it first for ease of handling?” The ties were simple, as one might use without bothering about the intricacies of binding, merely to make sure that the pages stayed together and in the...
6. To split (a text string) into smaller strings by separating on a delimiter.
   • It is also possible to save the delimiters (this might prove useful if the delimiters were also some sort of text identifier) and to count the length of the data items we are unstringing. - 1980, Norman R. Lyons,...

   Synonyms: explode split