enjoin

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English enjoinen, also engoinen and formerly in English injoin,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} borrowed from Old French enjoindre (“to impose, inflict, assign”), in particular its stem enjoign-,^[7][4][3] from Latin iniungō (“to join, attach; to impose”),^[8][3][9] from in- (“on, in”) and iungō (“to join”),^[8][5][3] from Proto-Indo-European *yeug- (“to join”).^[3][8] The same Latin verb gave Italian ingiugnere.^[7] The Anglo-Norman verb, recorded from 1160–74, meant to impose a penalty for sin in confession, to order and to prescribe, and also to attach oneself to.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

To impose a penalty or task, said especially of a spiritual director giving penance: about 1225, in the Ancrene Riwle.^[7][4] Barnhart dates the text to probably before 1200,^[4] Etymonline gives about 1200,^[3] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged the 13th century.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The first uses were about penance and other imposed duties,^[7] as in Piers Plowman: "Penaunce that the prest enjoigneth".^[11] By 1297, in Robert of Gloucester's chronicle, the verb took a person and a following clause or infinitive, so that it meant to command someone.^[7] Chaucer used it six times, for "order" and "prescribe".^[12] A sense nearer to the Latin, to join together, ran from about 1384, in the Wycliffite Bible, to 1680.^[7][13] Johnson (1755) placed the word between two others, calling it more authoritative than direct and less imperious than command.^[14] The sense "to forbid", from 1589 in Puttenham's Arte of English Poesie, has now narrowed to law, where it means to restrain by an injunction.^[7][13][2] In its extended senses, therefore, the same verb can mean both to order an act and to forbid it.^[15][2]

Timeline

• c. 1225 – to impose a penalty, task or duty.^[7][4]
• 1297 – to command a person to do something.^[7]
• c. 1384 – to join together (obsolete by 1680).^[7][13]
• 1562 – to order that something be done, with no personal object.^[7]
• 1589 – to prohibit; later, in law, to restrain by an injunction.^[7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To order someone to do something, with authority and emphasis: The doctor enjoined her to rest for a week.^[15][2][6]
2. To impose or prescribe a course of conduct or a duty.^[15][2][7]
3. (law) To prohibit or restrain by an injunction; also to require a person to do something: The court enjoined the firm from selling the drug.^[15][7][2]
4. (obsolete, c. 1384–1680) To join together.^[7][6][2]

Word family

• enjoiner
• enjoinment

Related words

• injunction
• join
• conjoin
• adjoin
• yoke

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
11. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
13. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
15. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins