Other forms: chains
A chain is metal rings linked together into a strong line. A gold chain, chain link, the chain came off.
Its strength is that of its weakest link, which is the fixed metaphor and also literally true. A chain is also a series of connected things — a chain of shops, a chain of events, the property chain, which in Britain is what makes house-buying so fraught. Note chain reaction; ball and chain; and chain as an old unit of length, sixty-six feet, which set the length of a cricket pitch.
1nounchainMetal rings linked together into a strong line.
“He locked his bike to the fence with a heavy chain.”
2nounseriesA series of connected things.
“One small mistake started a chain of events that ended in disaster.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
chain is a linked line.
Old French chaeine comes from Latin catena, a chain. Concatenate comes from the same word, and chain displaced the Old English racente.
Middle English
cheyne
English, today
chain
Built from
From Middle English cheyne. From Middle English cheyne, chaine, from Old French chaeine, chaene (“chain”), from Latin catēna (“chain”), from Proto-Indo-European kat- (“to braid, twist; hut, shed”). a doublet of catena. Displaced native rakil and rakent (from racente); see rackan.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA