confine
verb
- to restrict or keep within limits, literally or figuratively
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /kənˈfaɪn/ / /ˈkɒnfaɪn/ / /ˈkɑnfaɪn/
noun
Etymology: From Middle French confiner, from confins, from Medieval Latin confines, from Latin confinium, from confīnis.
- A boundary or limit.
- Confinement, imprisonment.
“She says for you to bring her a slice of cake, A bottle of the best wine, And not to forget the fair young lady That did release you from close confine.”
verb
Etymology: From Middle French confiner, from confins, from Medieval Latin confines, from Latin confinium, from confīnis.
- To have a common boundary with; to border on.
“Where your gloomy bounds / Confine with heaven”
“Betwixt heaven and earth and skies there stands a place / Confining on all three.”
- To restrict (someone or something) to a particular scope or area; to keep in or within certain bounds.
“Now let not nature's hand / Keep the wild flood confined! let order die!”
“1680, John Dryden, Ovid’s Epistles translated by several hands, London: Jacob Tonson, Preface, He is to confine himself to the compass of numbers and the slavery of rhyme.”