attach

From Middle English attachen, from Old French atachier, variant of estachier (“bind”), derived from estache (“stick”), from Frankish *stakkā, *stakō (“stick”), from Proto-Germanic *stakô (“pole, bar, stick, stake”). Doublet of attack. More at stake, stack.

• IPA^(key): /əˈtæt͡ʃ/

• Audio (Southern England)

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• Rhymes: -ætʃ
• Hyphenation: at‧tach

attach (third-person singular simple present attaches, present participle attaching, simple past and past participle attached)

1. (transitive) To fasten, to join to (literally and figuratively).

   Synonyms: connect, annex, affix, unite; see also Thesaurus:join

   Antonyms: detach, unfasten, disengage, separate; see also Thesaurus:disconnect

   You need to attach the carabiner to your harness.

   An officer is attached to a certain regiment, company, or ship.

   • 1802, William Paley, Natural Theology:

     The shoulder blade is […] attached only to the muscles.

   • 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volumes (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:

     A huge stone, to which the cable on the left bank was attached, was removed years later

   • 2013 July-August, Lee S. Langston, “The Adaptable Gas Turbine”, in American Scientist:

     Turbines have been around for a long time—windmills and water wheels are early examples. The name comes from the Latin turbo, meaning vortex, and thus the defining property of a turbine is that a fluid or gas turns the blades of a rotor, which is attached to a shaft that can perform useful work.

2. (intransitive) To adhere; to be attached.

   Synonyms: cling, stick; see also Thesaurus:adhere

   • 1838, Henry Brougham, Political Philosophy:

     The great interest which attaches to the mere knowledge of these facts cannot be doubted.

3. To come into legal operation in connection with anything; to vest.

   Dower will attach.

   • 1886, Thomas M. Cooley, A Treatise on the Law of Taxation:

     it therefore becomes important to know at what time the lien for taxes will attach.

4. To win the heart of; to connect by ties of love or self-interest; to attract; to fasten or bind by moral influence; with to.

   attached to a friend; attaching others to us by wealth or flattery

   • 1811, [Jane Austen], Sense and Sensibility […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC:

     incapable of attaching a sensible man

   • 1782, William Cowper, “Charity”, in Poems, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], →OCLC:

     God […] by various ties attaches man to man.

5. To connect, in a figurative sense; to ascribe or attribute; to affix; with to.

   to attach great importance to a particular circumstance

   • 1879, Bayard Taylor, Studies in German Literature:

     To this treasure a curse is attached.

6. (obsolete) To take, seize, or lay hold of.
   • c. 1595, William Shakespeare, Love's Labour's Lost, act 4, scene 3, lines 351–352:

     Then homeward every man attach the hand / Of his fair mistress.

7. (obsolete, law) To arrest, seize.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     Eftsoones the Gard, which on his state did wait, / Attacht that faitor false, and bound him strait […]

   • 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 III, scene ii]:

     Old lord, I cannot blame thee, / Who am myself attach'd with weariness / To th' dulling of my spirits: sit down, and rest.

   • 1868, Charlotte Mary Yonge, Cameos from English History:

     The earl marshal attached Gloucester for high treason.

• attachment

• chatta

• atach

From ad- + a Celtic pre-form tekʷom. The meaning "refuge" (attested mainly in the Milan glosses, where it is its only sense) is believed to be the original meaning, with its related literal sense vanishing from its associated verb before Old Irish.

attach n (genitive ataig)

1. refuge
   • c. 800–825, Diarmait, Milan Glosses on the Psalms, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 7–483, Ml. 66^d1

     .i. a·tá Día atach ṅdúnni aís de-threbo hónaib comfulidib echtrannaib .i. ar comfulidib ar chuit ceneuil .i. ais deich-thribo ro·echtrannaigtho [leg. roechtrannaigthea] huainn hua menmain naimtidiu.

     i.e. God is a refuge for us of the Two Tribes from alien kinsmen, i.e. our kinsmen by race, i.e. the Ten Tribes who were alienated from us by hostile mind.

2. verbal noun of ad·teich: invocation, beseeching
   • c. 800, Würzburg Glosses on the Pauline Epistles, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 499–712, Wb. 5^c17

     .i. nímchubandom attach trócaire frib; is tree rob·hícad.

     [illegible] to entreat mercy from you; it is through it that you pl have been saved.

   • c. 815-840, “The Monastery of Tallaght”, in Edward J. Gwynn, Walter J. Purton, transl., Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, volume 29, Royal Irish Academy, published 1911-1912, paragraph 7, pages 115-179:

     Tromde iarum, ro·búi frisim ind chaillech oc atach Dé co mór.

     Presently, the old woman wearied him with her loud praying to God.

   • c. 815-840, “The Monastery of Tallaght”, in Edward J. Gwynn, Walter J. Purton, transl., Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, volume 29, Royal Irish Academy, published 1911-1912, paragraph 58, pages 115-179:

     dígbail neich den praind ┐ attag nDé fris

     to take away part of the meal, and to invoke God in the matter

• Middle Irish: attach
  • Irish: atach
  • Scottish Gaelic: atach

• G. Toner, M. Ní Mhaonaigh, S. Arbuthnot, D. Wodtko, M.-L. Theuerkauf, editors (2019), “attach”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language