Ibounden

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Morally or legally required as a personal duty that a person cannot honorably avoid
2. Describing an obligation that is binding on someone, usually because of conscience, custom or oath
3. Owed as a matter of duty, so that one is compelled to fulfil it by honor or law

Etymology: "Ibounden" is an archaic English word, the older form of "unbound" in the sense of being bound by obligation: a duty or promise that ties you. It is an example of the Middle English prefix "y-" (from Old English "ge-"), which was attached to past participles and survived in English poetry long after it had died out of everyday speech. Spenser and other Elizabethan writers liked it for its archaic flavour. The base is "bounden," the past participle of "bind," which was itself the standard form in Middle English and early modern English; "bound" gradually displaced it. So "ibounden" is essentially "bound" with an extra prefix added in the older manner, meaning "bound" in the moral or legal sense. It is a case where a word from the medieval period was preserved in poetic and liturgical language after ordinary speech had moved on.

Synonyms: obliged, bound

Antonyms: free, unbound