Other forms: continued, continues, continuing
To continue is to keep doing something, or for something to keep happening. Continue working, the rain continued all day, to be continued.
It takes both an -ing form and an infinitive with almost no difference in meaning — continue working and continue to work are both correct, which is unusual and a small mercy. It is intransitive as well: the meeting continued. Carry on is the everyday phrasal equivalent and is far commoner in British speech. Note the useful formal continue with, taking a noun, and the noun continuation, which is the thing that follows rather than the act of following.
1verbcontinueTo keep doing something.
“She continued working long after everyone else had gone.”
2verbhappeningTo keep happening.
“The strike continued into a third week.”
3verbstartTo start again after a break.
“We will continue after lunch.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
continue is a way of keeping on.
Also accepted in games: carry on
Latin continuare meant to join together without a break, from continuus, uninterrupted — con- plus tenere, to hold. Continuing is holding on to something, and continent, content and tenant are all from the same holding.
Latin
continuō
Old French
continuer
Middle English
continuen
English, today
continue
From Middle English continuen, from Old French continuer, from Latin continuō. From Middle English continuen, from Old French continuer, from Latin continuō. Displaced native thurghwonen, from þurhwunian.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA