Other forms: impounded, impounds, impounding
To impound is to seize and hold something officially. Impound the vehicle, impounded by the police, an impound lot.
It means holding rather than confiscating: an impounded car can be released on payment, and the fees mount daily, which is where the real cost falls. It is used of vehicles, animals and documents. Note pound, meaning the enclosure such things are held in — the word is literally to put in the pound, which is where it comes from.
1verbimpoundTo seize and hold something officially.
“Customs officers impounded a shipment of fake watches at the port.”
impound is an official seizing.
Proto-Indo-European
*(s)pend- — to pull, stretch
Latin
pondō — by weight
Proto-Germanic
*pundą — pound, weight
Proto-West Germanic
*pund
Old English
pund — a pound, weight
Middle English
pound
English
pound
English, today
impound
Built from
From in- + pound. pound comes from Middle English pound, from Old English pund (“a pound, weight”), from Proto-West Germanic pund, from Proto-Germanic pundą (“pound, weight”), an early borrowing from Latin pondō (“by weight”), ablative form of pondus (“weight”), from Proto-Indo-European (s)pend- (“to pull, stretch”). Cognate with Dutch pond, German Pfund, Danish, Faroese, Icelandic, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish pund. a doublet of funt and pfund and pood and punt.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA