Other forms: binding, binds
To bind is to tie something fast, or to place under an obligation. Bind the wound, legally binding, bound by the agreement.
The legal sense is the busy one — a binding agreement is one a court will enforce, and whether something binds is the first question about any contract. Book binding is a craft of its own. The past is bound, and in a bind means in difficulty.
1verbbindTo tie something fast.
“Use string to bind the sticks together into a bundle.”
2verbplaceTo place under an obligation.
“The contract binds both sides to keep the price fixed for five years.”
bind is a tying, or an obliging.
Old English bindan, from a Germanic root. Band, bundle and bond come from the same tying.
Proto-Indo-European
*bʰendʰ-
Middle English
binden
English, today
bind
Built from
From Middle English binden. From Middle English binden, from Old English bindan, from Proto-West Germanic bindan, from Proto-Germanic bindaną, from Proto-Indo-European bʰéndʰ-e-ti, from bʰendʰ- (“to tie”). See also West Frisian bine, Dutch binden, Low German binnen, binden, German binden, Danish, Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk binde, Faroese, Icelandic and Swedish binda; also Welsh ben (“cart”), Latin offendīx (“knot, band”), Lithuanian beñdras (“partner”), Albanian bind (“to convince, to awe, to spell”), Ancient Greek πεῖσμα (“cable, rope”), Persian بستن (“to bind”), Sanskrit बन्धति. a doublet of bandana.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA