Halted

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /ˈhɔːltɪd/

Definitions

1. Brought to a full stop or cessation of movement or progress ; paused temporarily before continuing an action or process
2. Caused to cease moving or proceeding further ; briefly interrupted with the intention to resume later
3. Stopped completely, ending an activity or motion ; held in suspension momentarily without ending

Etymology: The verb "halt" has two separate origins that happen to have converged on one meaning. One line of descent runs through Middle French "halte" and an early modern German command, "halt!", the imperative of "halten", meaning "to hold" or "to stop." That German shout is a doublet of "hold," so the two English words are cousins that split apart long ago. Military and travel usage in English leaned on this stop-command sense. The other line is older and rougher. Old English "healt" meant "lame," and "healtian" meant "to walk with a limp." The verb "halten" in Middle English grew from that sense of hobbling, and it came to mean stopping only through the noun "halt," meaning a stop or pause in movement. So a word about a limping gait ended up describing an arrested motion. The two roots are unrelated in their ancestry, yet both happen to imply a break in forward motion, which is why "halted" can describe both a complete stop and a brief suspension.

Synonyms: stopped, paused, ceased

Antonyms: continued, proceeded