Emily Dickinson Lexicon

RE-CLAIM', v.t. [F. reclamer; L. reclamo; re and clamo, to call. See Claim.]

1. To claim back; to demand to have returned. The vender may reclaim the goods. – Z. Swift.
2. To call back from error, wandering or transgression, to the observance of moral rectitude; to reform; to bring back correct deportment or course of life. It is the intention of Providence in its various expressions of goodness, to reclaim mankind. – Rogers.
3. To reduce to the state desired. Much labor is requir'd in trees, to tame / Their wild disorder and in ranks reclaim. – Dryden.
4. To call back; to restrain. Or is her tow'ring flight reclaim'd, / By seas from Icarus' downfall nam'd? – Prior.
5. To recall; to cry out against. The headstrong horses hurried Octavius along, and were deaf to his reclaiming them. [Unusual.] – Dryden.
6. To reduce from a wild to a tame or domestic state; to tame; to make gentle; as, to reclaim a hawk, an eagle or a wild beast.
7. To demand or challenge; to make a claim; a French use.
8. To recover. – Spenser.
9. In ancient customs, to pursue and recall, as a vassal. – Encyc.
10. To encroach on what has been taken from one; to attempt to recover possession. A tract of land [Holland] snatched from an element perpetually reclaiming its prior occupancy. – Coxe, Switz.