noun
definition
Disobedience, resistance to authority.
Examples of contumacy in a Sentence
For this act of contumacy the king and kingdom were placed under interdict.
The pretext was the contumacy shown by the Locrian town Amphissa to the rulings of the Amphictyonic Council.
His long-deserved humiliation only began in the Winter of 1212-1213, when Innocent III., finding him so utterly callous as to the interdict, took the further step of declaring John does him deposed from the throne for contumacy, and the pope.
But the Druses still refused to pay taxes, to serve in the Ottoman army, or to recognize the kaimakam, and maintained their contumacy under the lead of the Jumblat, till 1896; when, as the result of a military expedition under Tahir Pasha and a great defeat at Ijun, a compromise was arrived at, under which the Druses agreed to pay taxes, but to serve in their own territory only as a frontier guard.
In 1592 parliament " ratified the liberty of the true kirk," leaving little liberty for king and state, since, in the phrase of one preacher, " the king might be excommunicated in case of contumacy and disobedience to the will of God," as interpreted by the ministers.
To obey would have meant death; to refuse in his own name would have been contumacy.
Alban's, Holborn, for contumacy, the archbishop, then on his deathbed at Addington, took steps which resulted in the carrying out of an exchange of benefices (which had already been projected), which removed him from the jurisdiction of the .court.
Not only were concubinary priests - a term which was now made to include also those who had openly married - forbidden to serve at the altar and threatened with actual deposition in cases of contumacy, but the laity were warned against attending mass said by "any priest certainly known to keep a concubine or subintroducta."' But these heroic measures soon caused serious embarrassment.
The most memorable acts of his pontificate were those arising out of the contumacy of the French king, Robert, who was ultimately brought to submission by the rigorous infliction of a sentence of excommunication.
In both 1715 and 1745 Dumfries remained apathetic. Prince Charles Edward indeed occupied the town, holding his court in a building afterwards known as the Commercial Hotel, levying £2000 tribute money and requisitioning 1000 pairs of shoes for his Highlanders, by way of punishing its contumacy.
It was chiefly under his influence that it was agreed by this ecclesiastical body at subsequent meetings to summon to the bar their "Burgher" brethren, and finally to depose and excommunicate them for contumacy.
When Charles Martel became the virtual ruler of the Frankish realm he brought the Bavarians into strict dependence, and deposed two dukes successively for contumacy.
Without entering into any examination of the charges brought before them, the synod condemned him on the ground of contumacy, and, hinting that his audacity merited the punishment of treason, called on the emperor to ratify and enforce their decision.
His contumacy was made the excuse for the outlawry of himself and his family.