Vanquish comes from Old French vainquir, from Latin vincere ('to conquer, overcome'); the form was influenced by Old French vencus, the past participle of veintre. The historical chain includes Old French vainquir and Latin vincere. The quoted older sense, "to conquer, overcome," supplies the immediate semantic anchor for vanquish. The formation is best read as participial and borrowed: the word vanquish carries its older form-history into a compact English lexical shape. In present English it is used as a verb, "to defeat thoroughly in battle or competition". English derivatives include vanquisher, vanquished, and vanquishment; related English forms include victor and convince. The result is a verb whose etymology preserves both the older form and the later English specialization.