Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A group of people.
  • noun A group of animals.
  • noun Anthropology A unit of social organization especially among hunter-gatherers, consisting of a usually small number of families living together cooperatively.
  • noun Canadian An aboriginal group officially recognized as an organized unit by the Canadian government.
  • noun A group of musicians who perform as an ensemble.
  • intransitive verb To assemble or unite in a group.
  • intransitive verb To form a group; unite.
  • noun A thin strip of flexible material used to encircle and bind one object or to hold a number of objects together.
  • noun A strip or stripe that contrasts with something else in color, texture, or material.
  • noun A narrow strip of fabric used to trim, finish, or reinforce articles of clothing.
  • noun Something that constrains or binds morally or legally.
  • noun A simple ungrooved ring, especially a wedding ring.
  • noun A neckband or collar.
  • noun The two strips hanging from the front of a collar as part of the dress of certain clerics, scholars, and lawyers.
  • noun A high collar popular in the 16th and 17th centuries.
  • noun Biology A chromatically, structurally, or functionally differentiated strip or stripe in or on an organism.
  • noun Anatomy A cordlike tissue that connects or holds structures together.
  • noun A specific range of wavelengths or frequencies of electromagnetic radiation.
  • noun A range of very closely spaced electron energy levels in solids, the distribution and nature of which determine the electrical properties of a material.
  • noun Any of the distinct grooves on a long-playing phonograph record that contains an individual selection or a separate section of a whole.
  • noun A cord or strip across the back of a book to which the sheets or quires are attached.
  • transitive verb To tie, bind, or encircle with or as if with a band.
  • transitive verb To mark or identify with a band.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A flat strip of any material, but especially of a flexible material, used to bind round anything; a fillet: as, a rubber band; a band around the head; a hat-band.
  • noun Anything resembling a band in form or function.
  • noun The form of collar commonly worn by men and women in the seventeenth century in western Europe.
  • noun The linen ornament worn about the neck, with the ends hanging down in front, by certain Protestant clergymen.
  • noun In mining, a layer of rock interstratified with the coal; sometimes, as in Cumberland, England, the coal itself.
  • noun A company of persons, especially a body of armed men; a company of soldiers, or of persons united for any purpose.
  • noun In music, a company of musicians playing various instruments in combination, in the manner of an orchestra: most frequently applied to a company of musicians playing such instruments as may be used in marching.
  • noun A collection of animals of any kind, as a drove of cattle or horses, or a flock of sheep.
  • To unite in a troop, company, or confederacy: generally reflexive.
  • To unite; associate; confederate for some common purpose.
  • noun A ridge of a hill: commonly applied in the English lake district to a long ridge-like hill of minor height, or to a long narrow sloping offshoot from a higher hill or mountain.
  • noun An obsolete or Scotch preterit of bind.
  • To interdict; banish.
  • Same as bandy.
  • noun A weight equal to about 2 ounces troy, in use in western Africa for weighing gold-dust.
  • noun In botany, the band-like space between the two mericarps of a cremocarp.
  • noun Anything which binds the person or the limbs, and serves to restrain or to deprive of liberty; a shackle, manacle, or fetter: usually in the plural.
  • noun That by which loose things of the same or a similar kind are bound together.
  • noun That which connects; a connecting piece, or means of connection; that which connects or unites the several parts of a complex thing.
  • noun Specifically— In logic, the copula.
  • noun The metallic sleeve which binds the barrel and stock of a musket together.
  • noun One of two pieces of iron fastened to the bows of a saddle to keep them in place.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Earlier bande, from Old French, banner, troop identified by its standard, of Germanic origin.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English bende (from Old English bend and from Old French bande, bende, of Germanic origin) and Middle English bond, band (from Old Norse, band); see bhendh- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English band, from Old French bande, from Old Provençal banda ("regiment of troops"), probably from West Germanic *banda or Gothic, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰendʰ- (“to tie, bind”).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English band (also bond), from Old English beand, bænd, bend ("bond, chain, fetter, band, ribbon, ornament, chaplet, crown"), from Proto-Germanic *bandaz, *bandiz (“band, fetter”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰendʰ- (“to tie, bind”). Middle English band reinforced by Old French bande. Cognate with Dutch band, German Band, Danish bånd, Swedish band, Icelandic bandur ("band"). Related to bond, bind, bend.

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