bondage
Americannoun
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slavery or involuntary servitude; serfdom.
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the state of being bound by or subjected to some external power or control.
- Synonyms:
- imprisonment, confinement, captivity, thralldom
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the state or practice of being physically restrained, as by being tied up, chained, or put in handcuffs, for sexual gratification.
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Early English Law. personal subjection to the control of a superior; villeinage.
noun
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slavery or serfdom; servitude
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Also called: villeinage. (in medieval Europe) the condition and status of unfree peasants who provided labour and other services for their lord in return for holdings of land
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a sexual practice in which one partner is physically bound
Related Words
See slavery.
Etymology
Origin of bondage
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English, from Anglo-Latin bondagium. See bond 2, -age
Explanation
Bondage is the state of being bound, like an enslaved person. If you're in handcuffs, you're in bondage. The word bondage has meant "condition of a serf or slave" since the 1300s, the same time the word bond came along to mean "anything that binds." Bondage originated around the time Dante was writing The Inferno, in which Satan flaps his wings to try and break free of bondage, as he's stuck in ice up to his chest.
Vocabulary lists containing bondage
Michelle Obama's Speech at the 2016 DNC
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Mahatma Gandhi's "Quit India" Speech
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The Tempest
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
He recounts marveling at the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of communism, which released Eastern Europe from bondage and allowed his own country to emerge from the shadow of the Soviet Union.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 9, 2026
“This festival is intended to lift up our ancestors that came to this country in bondage, terrorized, brutalized,” Ludlow said outside City Hall on Wednesday.
From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 5, 2026
Chris Farrimond, NCA Director of Threat Leadership, warned migrants who enter the UK "under these clandestine means" are "under increased risk of being forced into exploitation and debt bondage" by groups of people smugglers.
From BBC • Apr. 27, 2024
It is well known that the 14th Amendment revolutionized our Constitution, changing a document that sanctioned bondage into one that promised liberation and equal citizenship.
From Slate • Apr. 19, 2024
Now colored folks like Ophie and her mother, historically in bondage, exercised the freedom they did have to make their way to the city, escaping the chokehold of Jim Crow.
From "Ophie's Ghosts" by Justina Ireland
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
