Kenneth G. Wilson (1923–). The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. 1993.
rob, steal (vv.)
Rob poses a usage problem when used in the archaic sense meaning “steal,” as in The fox robbed the chickens. Standard English today prefers The fox robbed the henhouse or The fox robbed the farmer, but The fox stole [not robbed] the chickens (so long as he made off with them, not just with their possessions). Although rob does turn up sometimes in writing as to rob the loot, many still consider that use Nonstandard or dialectal. Note too that some purists insist that to rob your house, someone would have to take the whole structure—while you watched; to rob you, the thief would only have to make off with something of yours, not with you yourself. Nonetheless, modern usage seems regularly to permit the loose use of the passive voice, as in Our house was robbed last night while we were away, in all but the most conservative Edited English. Rob combines almost always with the preposition of, as in Indigestion robbed me of my sleep; from is occasionally heard and seen as well, as in Bad press relations robbed her hard-earned popularity from her, but it’s Substandard, and Edited English won’t have it. See BURGLARIZE.
