unbar

Claudius has made himself a monarch again, standing at the head of a shrieking horde of desperate peasantry who believe he can unbar the door to that heavenly place.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 11, 2025

Uncle Pullet had seen the party from the window, and made haste to unbar and unchain the front door.

From Tom and Maggie Tulliver by George Eliot

What humble hands unbar those gates of morn Through which the splendors of the New Day burst!

From Poems of James Russell Lowell With biographical sketch by Nathan Haskell Dole by James Russell Lowell

Etym., débacler, French, to unbar, to break up as a river does at the cessation of a long-continued frost.

From Principles of Geology or, The Modern Changes of the Earth and its Inhabitants Considered as Illustrative of Geology by Sir Charles Lyell

She is the blush of morn first caught by earth, When seraph hands unbar the gates of heaven, And from its courts bright beams of glory stream.

From Joan of Arc A Play in Five Acts by Jane Alice Sargant

The book’s final moments are breathless, if suspiciously flimsy—it isn’t until the very last sentence that Monk unbars “the great gate” and is freed.

From Slate ● Mar. 22, 2017

Will the sun forget to streak Eastern skies with amber ray, When the dusky shades to break He unbars the gates of day?

From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall

For as a gate of sorrow-land unbars   The region of unfaltering delight,   So may you gather from the fields of night That harvest of diviner thought, the stars.

From The Diwan of Abu'l-Ala by Henry Baerlein

Soon as to Ilion's topmost tower they come, And awful reach the high Palladian dome, Antenor's consort, fair Theano, waits As Pallas' priestess, and unbars the gates.

From The Iliad by Alexander Pope

Then, when the sacred senate votes the wars, The Roman consul their decree declares, And in his robes the sounding gates unbars.

From The Aeneid English by Virgil

As a result, its classification was changed from unbarred spiral galaxy to barred spiral galaxy.

From Salon ● Apr. 23, 2022

Eventually, we decided that my father would not recover, and so, instead of continuing to try to stave off death, we unbarred the door and began to wait.

From The New Yorker ● Feb. 5, 2017

In both barred and unbarred spiral galaxies, we observe a range of different shapes.

From Textbooks ● Oct. 13, 2016

Handel’s vocal writing can be fiercely demanding, nowhere more so than in the Angel’s opening aria, “Be unbarred, ye gates of Avernus,” in which Liv Redpath, a soprano, displayed lovely tone and fine agility.

From New York Times ● Dec. 9, 2014

The fetters would not keep fastened; the doors unbarred themselves.

From "Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes" by Edith Hamilton

Knees, shoulders, elbows, buttocks and teeth collide with one another, fleetingly unbarring a glimpse into deeper space before they slide closed again.

From Slate ● Sep. 25, 2011

They got enough, however, to realise that he demanded the unbarring of the door, and that he both threatened and promised protection to whoever was within.

From The Strange Case of Cavendish by Randall Parrish

“Why, it’s the young lady from the Deanery!” exclaimed Manfred Hegner in a relieved voice; and both he and his wife began hastily unlocking and unbarring the great plate-glass doors.

From Good Old Anna by Marie Belloc Lowndes

We wait receptively, unbarring all our rust-hinged doors to welcome the true favors that now find us.

From The Optimist's Good Morning by Florence Hobart Perin

They heard the challenge of the sentry within, and then the unbarring of the gates.

From Come Rack! Come Rope! by Robert Hugh Benson