Crossword clues for fetter
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Fetter \Fet"ter\ (f[e^]t"t[~e]r), n. [AS. fetor, feter; akin to OS. feter[=o]s, pl., OD. veter, OHG. fezzera, Icel. fj["o]turr, L. pedica, Gr. pe`dh, and to E. foot. [root] 77. See Foot.] [Chiefly used in the plural, fetters.]
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A chain or shackle for the feet; a chain by which an animal is confined by the foot, either made fast or disabled from free and rapid motion; a bond; a shackle.
[They] bound him with fetters of brass.
--Judg. xvi. 21. -
Anything that confines or restrains; a restraint.
Passion's too fierce to be in fetters bound.
--Dryden.
Fetter \Fet"ter\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Fettered; p. pr. & vb. n. Fettering.]
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To put fetters upon; to shackle or confine the feet of with a chain; to bind.
My heels are fettered, but my fist is free.
--Milton. -
To restrain from motion; to impose restraints on; to confine; to enchain; as, fettered by obligations.
My conscience! thou art fettered More than my shanks and wrists.
--Shak.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Old English fetor "chain or shackle by which a person or animal is bound by the feet," figuratively "check, restraint," from Proto-Germanic *fetero (cognates: Old Saxon feteros (plural), Middle Dutch veter "fetter," in modern Dutch "lace, string," Old High German fezzera, Old Norse fiöturr, Swedish fjätter "fetter"), from PIE root *ped- (1) "foot" (see foot (n.)). The generalized sense of "anything that shackles" had evolved in Old English. Related Fetters.
c.1300, from Old English gefetrian, from the noun (see fetter (n.)). Related: Fettered; fettering.
Wiktionary
n. 1 A chain or similar object used to bind a person or animal – often by its legs ''(usually in plural)''. 2 (context figurative English) Anything that restricts or restrains. vb. 1 (context transitive English) To shackle or bind up with fetters 2 (context transitive English) To restrain or impede; to hamper.
WordNet
Gazetteer
Wikipedia
In Buddhism, a mental fetter, chain or bond ( Pāli: samyojana, saŋyojana, saññojana) shackles a sentient being to sasāra, the cycle of lives with dukkha. By cutting through all fetters, one attains nibbāna ( Pali; Skt.: nirvāa).
Fetter and similar can mean:
- Fetters are a type of leg restraint
- See Fetter (Buddhism) for the Buddhist concept of mental fetter
- Fetter v. Beale' is an important law case about the crime of mayhem (crime)
- The French word entravé = "in fetters" can mean "of a vowel, [to be] in a closed syllable"
- Metaphorically, a fetter may be anything that restricts or restrains in any way, hence the word "unfettered"
Usage examples of "fetter".
Gordon, through the long day, continued to squirm and hitch to increase the abrasion on the fetter.
He thought it desperate to tarry, 115 And venture to be accessary But rather wisely slip his fetters, And leave them for the Knight, his betters.
He still wrote scholarly articles for geographical journals, and Pitt had a deep suspicion that if Dacre were not held by the twin fetters of duty and heritage, he would be happily traveling in the Antipodes somewhere, making maps.
The first and second were successfully darted, and we saw the whales staggeringly running off, fettered by the enormous sidelong resistance of the towing drugg.
Two of them had been deadlong deadand another had been so deranged that when he was brought up on deck for his fetters to be struck off, he had thrown himself overboard and sunk like a stone.
Oh, I wish I could make you see how much my mind is at this moment like a rayless dungeon, with one shrinking fear fettered in its depths -- the fear of being persuaded by you to attempt what I cannot accomplish!
But in his countenance I saw a change: that looked desperate and brooding -- that reminded me of some wronged and fettered wild beast or bird, dangerous to approach in his sullen woe.
And when the old man tried to move, he found that his arms and legs were fettered with iron, held tight to the peculiar high, narrow bed or cot on which he lay.
One door was fettered by two closed padlocks, which were large and strong, and mounted upon separate heavy hasps.
He had been anaesthetized and stripped of his weapons, and as he rose to his feet he saw that one ankle was fettered to a chain in the wall.
The fettered ankle halted his first step, but he stretched at full length along the table, extending eager fingers toward the prize.
The boat returned, barely half an hour later, with two fettered convicts and a private marine, whose wrists were also pinioned, crouching between the thwarts.
It was only when, to prevent his attempting prematurely to escape, Phillip assigned an elderly convict to act as his guardian and had one of his wrists fettered, that Manly became sullen and dejected .
Dead March, the parade was formed into marching order, and the chaplain went to take his place beside the fettered prisoners, reading from his prayer book.
They halted by the door, and she counted five of them, all apparently fettered, and two, at least, armed with clubs.