distrain

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To seize and hold (property) to compel payment or reparation, as of debts.
2. v. To seize the property of (a person) in order to compel payment of debts; distress.
3. v. To levy a distress.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To pull or tear asunder; rend apart.
2. To press with force; bear with force upon; constrain; compel.
3. To restrain; bind; confine.
4. To distress; torment; afflict.
5. To gain or take possession of; seize; secure.
6. In law: To take and withhold (another's chattel), in order to apply it in satisfaction of the distrainor's demand against him, or to hold it until he renders satisfaction. The right to distrain was recognized at common law as a private remedy in the nature of a reprisal, by which a person might take the personal property of another into his possession, and hold it as a pledge or security until satisfaction was made, as by the payment of a debt, the discharge of some duty, or as reparation for an injury done, with the right in certain cases to sell it to obtain satisfaction —as in the instance of the impounding of cattle, damage feasant, or the taking by the landlord of the goods and chattels of a tenant while still npon the premises, for the non-payment of rent.
7. To seize and hold in satisfaction of a demand or claim, or in order to compel the performance of an obligation; seize under judicial process or authority: said of any movable property, or of goods and chattels. See distringas and distress.
8. To make seizure of goods in satisfaction of a claim, or in order to compel the performance of an obligation.

Wiktionary

1. v. obsolete To squeeze, press; to constrain, oppress.
2. v. law, transitive, obsolete To force (someone) to do something by seizing their property.
3. v. law, intransitive To seize somebody's property in place of, or to force, payment of a debt.
4. v. obsolete To pull off, tear apart.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. obsolete To press heavily upon; to bear down upon with violence; hence, to constrain or compel; to bind; to distress, torment, or afflict.
2. v. obsolete To rend; to tear.
3. v. To seize, as a pledge or indemnification; to take possession of as security for nonpayment of rent, the reparation of an injury done, etc.; to take by distress.
4. v. To subject to distress; to coerce.
5. v. To levy a distress.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. legally take something in place of a debt payment
2. v. levy a distress on
3. v. confiscate by distress