Forhold
verb ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 To detain, hold back, or hold up (someone or something); also, to retain or withhold (something). archaic, rare, transitive
"And thegħ he lang ther-to-for was ded, for drede of Iresshe-men, he was for-hold tyl Reymondes comes, & the meygnees, ynto leynestre."
Example
More examples"And thegħ he lang ther-to-for was ded, for drede of Iresshe-men, he was for-hold tyl Reymondes comes, & the meygnees, ynto leynestre."
Etymology
From Middle English forholden (“to withhold; to keep (a corpse) unburied”) [and other forms], from Old English forhealdan (“to keep or hold back (something), withhold; to hold away; to disregard, neglect; to hold wrongly, not to keep in good condition”), from for- (prefix meaning ‘away from; wrongly’) + healdan (“to grasp, hold fast; to possess”) (from Proto-West Germanic *haldan (“to hold; to keep”), from Proto-Germanic *haldaną (“to hold; to keep”); further etymology uncertain, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *ḱel- (“to cover; to conceal, hide”)). The English word is analysable as for- + hold, and is cognate with Danish forholde (“to relate”), Dutch verhouden (“to relate”), Low German vorholden (“to detain”), German verhalten (“to control, restrain”), Norwegian forholde (“to deal”).
Related phrases
More for "forhold"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.