fetter
pronunciation
How to pronounce fetter in British English:
UK [ˈfetə(r)]
How to pronounce fetter in American English:
US [ˈfetər]
-
- Noun:
- a shackle for the ankles or feet
-
- Verb:
- restrain with fetters
Word Origin
- fetter
- fetter: [OE] Etymologically, fetters are shackles for restraining the ‘feet’. The word comes from prehistoric Germanic *feterō, which derived ultimately from the same Indo-European base, *ped-, as produced English foot. The parallel Latin formation, incidentally, was pedica ‘fetter’, from which English gets impeach.=> foot, impeach, pedal
- fetter (n.)
- 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.
- fetter (v.)
- c. 1300, from Old English gefetrian, from the noun (see fetter (n.)). Related: Fettered; fettering.
Example
- 1. A clog or fetter on the equity of redemption is void .
- 2. We only between fetter , called my mind .
- 3. So for south african capital , apartheid had become a fetter on the mode of production .
- 4. Let only that little of my fetters be left whereby I am bound with thy will , and thy purpose is carried out in my life-and that is the fetter of thy love .
- 5. The forces that fetter our souls .