abandon means to give up or relinquish control of, to surrender or to give oneself over, or to yield to one's emotions. It carries an Arena rating of 1768, earned across 5 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, abandon ranks #622 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #1,567 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #3,140 of 17,134 for Most Malleable Words, #3,463 of 17,124 for Most Sublime Words.
abandon is pronounced /əˈbæn.dən/.
Why “abandon” is a great word
To give up control of, leave completely and finally, or yield oneself without restraint. From Middle English *abandounen*, from Old French *abandoner*, from a ("to, at") + *bandon* ("control, jurisdiction"), from Late Latin *bannum* ("proclamation"), from Frankish *ban* ("command, proclamation"), from Proto-Germanic *bannaną* ("to proclaim, command"). Unlike "forsake," which severs a sacred bond, or "relinquish," which denotes a tidy legal transfer, "abandon" carries the weight of irrevocable surrender and the wildness of release. It is a silent house with the door left swinging, a principle crumpled and tossed aside, or the ecstatic, reckless arc of a body leaping into a dark sea—the moment control is not lost, but cast off, as one might cast off a shore they no longer believe in.
Etymology
From Middle English abandounen, from Old French abandoner, formed from a (“at, to”) + bandon (“jurisdiction, control”), from Late Latin bannum (“proclamation”), bannus, bandum, from Frankish *ban, *bann, from Proto-Germanic *bannaną (“to proclaim, command”) (whence English ban), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to speak”). See also ban, banal. Displaced Middle English forleten (“to abandon”), from Old English forlǣtan, anforlǣtan; see forlet; and Middle English forleven (“to leave behind, abandon”), from Old English forlǣfan; see forleave. Compare typologically abdicate, Russian отказа́ться (otkazátʹsja) (akin to приказа́ть (prikazátʹ), сказа́ть (skazátʹ), указа́ть (ukazátʹ)).
verb
- To give up or relinquish control of, to surrender or to give oneself over, or to yield to one's emotions.e.g.“[…] he abandoned himself […] to his favourite vice.” — 1856, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James II. Volume 3, page 312:
- To desist in doing, practicing, following, holding, or adhering to; to turn away from; to permit to lapse; to renounce; to discontinue.
- To leave behind; to desert, as in a ship, a position, or a person, typically in response to overwhelming odds or impending dangers; to forsake, in spite of a duty or responsibility.e.g.“Many baby girls have been abandoned on the streets of Beijing.”
- To subdue; to take control of.
- To cast out; to banish; to expel; to reject.e.g.“Being all this time abandoned from your bed.” — 1594, William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, act I, scene ii:
- To no longer exercise a right, title, or interest, especially with no interest of reclaiming it again; to yield; to relinquish.e.g.“I hereby abandon my position as manager.”
- To surrender to the insurer (an insured item), so as to claim a total loss.
noun
- A yielding to natural impulses or inhibitions; freedom from artificial constraint, with loss of appreciation of consequences. (Now especially in the phrase with abandon.)e.g.“with gay abandon, with wild abandon, with reckless abandon”
- Abandonment; relinquishment.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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