bated

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   held back, reduced, or restrained, now used chiefly in the phrase 'with bated breath'

   The audience waited with bated breath for the final result.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Bated is a Middle English shortened form of abated, meaning “reduced” or “lessened.” It ultimately comes from Old French abattre, “to fell,” from Latin ad, “to” or “at,” and batt(u)ere, “to beat.” In the late 16th-century phrase “with bated breath,” anxiety or excitement while waiting is imagined as becoming so great that one almost stops breathing.

The past participle of bate, an aphetic form of abate ("to lessen or restrain"). In bated breath, recorded from the late sixteenth century, the breath is figuratively held back in suspense.

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