RE: How to rescind a defun?

[Drew Adams]

> >> If, during an Emacs session, one evaluates a defun that 
> >> (inadvertently) redefines an existing function, is it
> >> possible to undo this?
> 
> > See function `fmakunbound'.
> 
> Thanks, I would have never found this!
> 
> Unfortunately, it seems that the original definition is gone.  (I
> had hoped that the new definition was just shadowing the original
> one, so that rescinding the former would "resurrect" the latter.)

I see now what you meant by "undo".

No, within a given namespace (obarray) and a given program scope (e.g. `flet' or
`labels' binding), a symbol has only one function definition.  

And for a global function definition, assignment is used, not binding.  So there
is no shadowing.