redound
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɹɪˈdaʊnd/
ipa: /ɹəˈdaʊnd/
rhymes: -aʊnd
Forms: form: redounds
form: redounding
form: redounded
form: redounded
Etymology: From Anglo-Norman redunder, Middle French redonder, and their source, Latin rēdundō, from red- + undō (“surge”), from unda (“a wave”).
Senses: examples: text: For every dram of hony therein found / A pound of gall doth over it redound […].
ref: 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
glosses: To swell up (of water, waves etc.); to overflow, to surge (of bodily fluids).
examples: text: The honour done to our religion ultimately redounds to God, the author of it.
ref: a. 1729, John Rogers, A prudent cobduct recommended and enforced:
text: The fact that in one case the advance redounds to private advantage and in the other, theoretically, to the public good, does not alter the core assumptions common to both.
ref: 1970, Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, Bantam Books, page 448:
text: He [Sam Altman] came with a message that was both chilling and inspiring: without proper controls, advanced artificial intelligence might spell doom—but if you trust OpenAI to build it first, the technology will redound to the good of humanity.
ref: 2025 May 24, Richard Waters, “AI's flawed frontman”, in FT Weekend, Books, page 10:
glosses: To contribute to an advantage or disadvantage for someone or something.
examples: text: I did not omit even our Sports and Paſtimes, or any other Particular which I thought might redound to the Honour of my Country.
ref: 1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “Several Contrivances of the Author to Please the King and Queen. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume I, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part II (A Voyage to Brobdingnag), page 259:
text: One thing about the ‘John McCain-didn’t-sleep-with-a-lobbyist’ story redounds to the New York Times’ credit.
ref: 2008 March 2, Peter Preston, The Observer:
text: Runciman viewed many of the Crusades’ protagonists with sympathy, but he thought that the movement as a whole was destructive and did not redound to the honour of the faith.
ref: 2019, Αντώνιος Καλδέλλης [Anthony Kaldellis], Byzantium Unbound (Past Imperfect), Leeds: Arc Humanities Press, →ISBN, chapter 4: “Byzantium Was Not Medieval”, pages 87–88:
roman: Anthony Kaldellis
glosses: To contribute to the honour, shame etc. of a person or organisation.
glosses: To reverberate, to echo.
glosses: To reflect (honour, shame etc.) to or onto someone.
examples: text: His infamous behaviour only redounded back upon him when he was caught.
text: […] that is, they concede the accuracy of certain classic attacks on communism, but in ways that redound on their opponents.
ref: 2022, China Miéville, chapter 3, in A Spectre, Haunting: On the Communist Manifesto, →OCLC:
glosses: To attach, come back, accrue to someone; to reflect back on or upon someone (of honour, shame etc.).
glosses: To arise from or out of something.
examples: text: The evil, soon driven back, redounded as a flood on those from whom it sprung.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book VII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
qualifier: flood
glosses: To roll back; to be sent or driven back.
raw_tags: of a wave
Related terms: redundance
redundancy
redundant