manacle
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈmænək(ə)l/
ipa: /ˈmænəkəl/
Forms: form: manacles
form: manacling
form: manacled
form: manacled
Etymology: The noun is derived from Middle English manacle, manakelle, manakil, manakyll, manicle, manikil, manycle, manykil, manykle, from Anglo-Norman manicle, manichle (“gauntlet; handle of a plough; (in plural) manacles”), and Middle French manicle, Old French manicle (“armlet; gauntlet; (in plural) manacles”) (modern French manicle, manique (“gauntlet”)), from Latin manicula (“handle of a plough; manacle”), from manus (“hand”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)meh₂- (“to beckon, signal”)) + -cula (from -culus, variant of -ulus (suffix forming diminutive nouns)).
The verb is probably derived from the noun, although according to the Oxford English Dictionary it is attested slightly earlier.
Senses: examples: text: [C]ome, / Ile manacle thy necke and feete together: / Sea water ſhalt thou drinke: thy food ſhall be / The freſh-brooke Muſſels, wither'd roots, and huskes / Wherein the Acorne cradled.
ref: 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 6, column 1:
text: My lord, I humbly desire that we may not be manacled; if you make any doubt of us, that we may have a greater guard upon us. [...] Mr. Sheriff, I desire that this manacling may be forborn: if you please to clap a guard of a hundred men upon us, I shall pay for it. This is not only a disgrace to me, but in general to all soldiers; which doth more trouble me than the loss of my life.
ref: 1649, “185. The Trial of Colonel John Morris, Governor of Pontefract Castle; at the Assizes at the Castle of York, before Mr. John Puleston, and Mr. Baron Thorpe, Justices of Assize, for High Treason: […]”, in [William] Cobbett, editor, Cobbett’s Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason and Other Crimes and Misdemeanours from the Earliest Period to the Present Time, volume IV, London: Printed by T[homas] C[urson] Hansard, […]; published by R. Bagshaw [et al.], published 1809, →OCLC, column 1266:
text: A few weeks since we gave an account of a company of men, women and children, part of whom were manacled, passing through our streets. Last week, a number of slaves were driven through the main street of our city, among whom were a number manacled together, two abreast, all connected by, and supporting a heavy iron chain, which extended the whole length of the line. [From the Western Luminary, Lexington, Kentucky.]
ref: 1833, “Tortures, by Iron Collars, Chains, Fetters, Handcuffs, &c.”, in American Slavery as It Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses (The Anti-Slavery Examiner; 10), New York, N.Y.: Published by the American Anti-Slavery Society, […], published May 1839, →OCLC, page 76, column 1:
text: As it came nearer, I saw it to be Magwitch, swimming, but not swimming freely. He was taken on board, and instantly manacled at the wrists and ankles.
ref: 1860 December – 1861 August, Charles Dickens, chapter XV, in Great Expectations […], volume III, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published October 1861, →OCLC, page 259:
text: Not satisfied with the feats by which he has won the title of "Handcuff King," this man recently dropped from a height of 98 ft. into the harbor at Sydney, Australia, with his hands manacled behind his back, and his eyes blindfolded. A year or so ago his "star" feat was making an escape from a bag in which he was placed, both hands and feet manacled, and thrown into the water.
ref: 1912 February, “Drops, Manacled, in Water from 98-foot Height”, in H[enry] H[aven] Windsor, editor, Popular Mechanics Magazine, volume 17, number 2, Chicago, Ill.: Popular Mechanics Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 253, column 2:
text: You have shown yourself a mighty fighter, and we do not wish to manacle you, so we hold you both in the easiest way that will yet ensure security.
ref: 1912 February–July, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Under the Moons of Mars”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co., →OCLC; republished as “A Duel to the Death”, in A Princess of Mars, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., 1917 October, →OCLC, pages 143–144:
glosses: To confine with manacles.