refrain

See also: Refrain

English

Pronunciation

  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ɹɪˈfɹeɪn/
  • (General American, Canada) IPA(key): /ɹiˈfɹeɪn/, /ɹə-/, /ɹɪ-/
    • Audio (California); /ɹiˈfɹeɪn/:(file)
  • (Australia) IPA(key): /ɹɪˈfɹæɪn/
  • (New Zealand) IPA(key): /ɹəˈfɹæɪn/
  • Rhymes: -eɪn

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle English refreynen, from Anglo-Norman refrener, Old French refrener, from Latin refrēnāre, from re- +‎ frēnāre, from frēnum.

Verb

refrain (third-person singular simple present refrains, present participle refraining, simple past and past participle refrained)

  1. (transitive, archaic) To hold back, to restrain (someone or something). [from 14th c.]
  2. (reflexive, archaic) To show restraint; to hold oneself back. [from 14th c.]
  3. (transitive, now rare) To repress (a desire, emotion etc.); to check or curb. [from 14th c.]
    Synonym: hold
  4. (intransitive, with preposition "from") To stop oneself from some action or interference; to abstain; to eschew [from 15th c.]
  5. (transitive, rare, regional) To abstain from (food or drink). [from 16th c.]
Derived terms
Translations
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Translations to be checked

Etymology 2

    From French refrain, from the Old French verb refraindre (“to break off, repeat”), from Latin re- (“back, again”) + frangō (“break”); compare Occitan refranhs (“a refrain”), refranher (“to repeat”). See refract and the verb refrain.

    Noun

    refrain (plural refrains)

    1. The chorus or burden of a song repeated at the end of each verse or stanza.
      • 1949 June 8, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter 1, in Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC; republished [Australia]: Project Gutenberg of Australia, August 2001:
        For perhaps as much as thirty seconds they kept it up. It was a refrain that was often heard in moments of overwhelming emotion. Partly it was a sort of hymn to the wisdom and majesty of Big Brother, but still more it was an act of self-hypnosis, a deliberate drowning of consciousness by means of rhythmic noise.
    2. (by extension) A much repeated comment, complaint, or saying.
      Synonym: old saw
    Translations

    References

    Anagrams

    French

    Etymology

    Alteration of Old French refrait, past participle of the verb refraindre (based on the verb's infinitive), itself from Vulgar Latin *refrangere, from Latin refringere.

    Pronunciation

    • IPA(key): /ʁə.fʁɛ̃/
    • Audio:(file)

    Noun

    refrain m (plural refrains)

    1. refrain, chorus

    Derived terms

    Descendants

    • → Danish: refræn
    • → English: refrain
    • → German: Refrain
    • → Greek: ρεφρέν (refrén)
    • → Italian: refrain
    • → Spanish: refrán

    Further reading

    Anagrams

    Italian

    Etymology

      Borrowed from French refrain.

      Noun

      refrain m (invariable)

      1. refrain
        Synonym: ritornello

      Further reading

      • “refrain”, in Vocabolario Treccani on line (in Italian), Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 2026

      Anagrams

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