Other forms: obliged, obliges, obliging
To oblige is to bind somebody by duty or law — or, quite differently, to do them a favour. Two senses that sound almost opposite.
The binding sense is formal and usually passive, so being obliged to attend means having no choice, and the law obliges you to do a great many things. The favour sense is warm and old-fashioned, and happy to oblige is a set phrase said by somebody agreeing to help. Much obliged is a dated way of saying thank you. The noun obligation belongs only to the first sense.
Proto-Indo-European
*leyǵ-
Latin
obligo
Old French
obligier
Middle English
obligen
English, today
oblige
From Middle English obligen, from Old French obligier, obliger, from Latin obligo, from ob- + ligō. a doublet of obligate, taken straight from Latin.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in A Man Called Ove
First appears in chapter 14 of A Man Called Ove.
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