Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1946, from instant (Latin instantia) + -ate. Related: Instantiated; instantiation.
Wiktionary
vb. 1 (context transitive English) To represent (something) by a concrete instance. (from 20th c.) 2 (context transitive object-orientated computing English) To create an object (an instance) of a specific class. (from 20th c.)
WordNet
v. represent by an instance; "This word instantiates the usage that the linguists claimed to be typical for a certain dialect"
find an instance of (a word or particular usage of a word); "The linguists could not instantiate this sense of the noun that he claimed existed in a certain dialect"
Usage examples of "instantiate".
Even assuming the necessary devices could be instantiated and configured, what would be the point?
He pirates fax patterns out of the Iscog, and instantiates them in secret, in dungeons hidden away from civilized eyes and sensors.
We feel obliged to instantiate his personality as often as possible, even though you can only do so much with a couple of petabytes of recordings.
They instantiated the Blight and incidentally -- perhaps a little later -- the defense program.
They instantiated the Blight and incidentally--perhaps a little later--the defense program.
Even if he could get his hands on the package of souls Portia was carrying for the Propagators, he had no easy way of instantiating Erica's mind, let alone growing her a new body.