hold

Pronunciation: /həʊld/

The English word “hold” has 20 meanings listed here.

verb

To grasp or grip.
To contain or store.
To have and keep possession of something.
To reserve.
To cause to wait or delay.
To halt or delay (medication) temporarily.
To detain.
To be or remain valid; to apply (usually in the third person).
To keep oneself in a particular state.
To impose restraint upon; to limit in motion or action; to bind legally or morally; to confine; to restrain.
To bear, carry, or manage.
Not to move; to halt; to stop.
Not to give way; not to part or become separated; to remain unbroken or unsubdued.
To remain continent; to control an excretory bodily function.
To maintain, to consider, to opine.
To bind (someone) to a consequence of his or her actions.
To maintain in being or action; to carry on; to prosecute, as a course of conduct or an argument; to continue; to sustain.
To accept, as an opinion; to be the adherent of, openly or privately; to persist in, as a purpose; to maintain; to sustain.
To restrain oneself; to refrain; to hold back.
To win one's own service game.

Etymology

Derived from Middle English holden, derived from Old English healdan, derived from Proto-West Germanic *haldan, derived from Proto-Germanic *haldaną (“to tend, herd”), maybe derived from Proto-Indo-European *kel- (“to drive”). Doublet of halt. Cognates *West Frisian hâlde *Low German holden, holen *Dutch houden *German halten *Danish *Norwegian Bokmål holde *Norwegian Nynorsk halda. Compare Latin…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.