retrench

verb

1. (transitive)To cut down or reduce.

   “Madam me no Madam, but learn to retrench your vvords; and ſay Mam; as yes Mam, and no Mam, as other Ladies VVomen do. Madam! 'tis a year in pronouncing.”

   “Foppiſh and fantaſtick Ornaments are only Indications of Vice, not criminal in themſelves. Extinguiſh Vanity in the Mind, and you naturally retrench the little Superfluities of Garniture and Equipage. The Bloſſoms will fall of themſelves, when the Root that nouriſhes them is deſtroyed.”

   “I must desire that you will not think of enlarging your expenses, no not for some years to come, much less at present; but rather retrench them. You might have lain destitute till Antichrist came, for any thing you could have got from those you used to treat; neither let me hear of one rag of better clothes for your wife or brats, but rather plainer than ever.”

   “And it would signal to a wider world that Britain is retrenching and not developing its infrastructure to enable growth.”

2. (specifically, transitive)To cut down or reduce.

   “This section prescribes that an employer shall ordinarily retrench the workman who was the last person to be employed in that category, unless for reasons to be recorded in writing, the employer retrenches any other workman.”

3. (transitive)To confine; to limit; to restrict.

   “They say of God—That He spreadeth forth the heavens as a tent to dwell in; and that as a garment, some time hence, He shall roll them together. These figures, ought they then to receive a retrenched interpretation? Ought they to be denuded of their oriental garb? Not so, […]”

4. (transitive)To furnish with a retrenchment (a defensive work within a fortification).

   “to retrench bastions”

   “Captain Allaud did not doubt that the principal attack would be directed towards the left bastion; he had the gorge of this bastion therefore retrenched during the night.”

5. (intransitive)To abridge; to curtail.

   “But this thy glory ſhall be ſoon retrench'd; / No more ſhalt thou by oracling abuſe / The Gentiles; henceforth Oracles are ceaſt, / And thou no more with Pomp and Sacrifice / Shalt by enquir'd at Delphos or elſewhere, / At leaſt in vain, for they ſhall find thee mute.”

6. (intransitive)To take up a new defensive position.

   “We must retrench and try to hold on long enough for products in development to reach the market or we will be out of business.”

   “Whether we choose to live there or just retreat for a rest, the closet is a stronghold of gay life. Someday we'll force hets to deal with us out in the world, but for now, I guess it's better to retrench in the closet than never to come out at all.”

   “After retrenching itself in scholarship and literary imagination, Orientalism has moved on to conquer film, television and CD-ROMs. Nowadays, the subject of Orientalism is not limited to what is conventionally seen as the 'Orient' but also includes Europe, the home of its origins, itself.”

   “Some smaller private-equity firms in continental Europe are struggling even more than British outfits, weakening the competition. International firms could decide it is not cost-effective to keep open their other European offices and retrench to London.”

   “It's an episode of characters returning to their own pasts as different people. They can retrench like Cersei, back on her bullshit, I mean, warpath. Or they can adapt, like The Hound. Neither way necessarily ensures success, but we know the archmaester isn't unequivocally right. We’ve seen dragons reborn and armies of the undead. I wouldn’t be so sure that Wall will stand forever.”

7. (intransitive)To live less expensively; to economize.
8. (transitive)To dig or redig a trench where one already exists.

   “The [fishing] technique was to clear the channel downstream from the lagoon for about twenty to forty yards, but not all the way to the salt water. A small "bridge" was left at the lower end of the lagoon. When holding pits had been dug near the end of the re-trenched channel and everyone was ready, the "bridge" was dug out and the outrush of water brought hundreds of fish along with it.”