Banded

How to spell banded

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce banded

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does banded mean?

1. verbPast tense of band: to unite or join with others for a shared purpose, or to mark or fasten something with a strip or hoop.
2. adjectiveMarked with stripes, hoops, or contrasting bands of colour or material.

Banded in a sentence

• verb

  The neighbours banded together to fight the new development.

• adjective

  The banded agate showed clear layers of brown and white.

• verb

  Researchers banded the migrating birds to track their routes.

• adjective

  She chose a banded wool scarf with horizontal stripes.

Where does banded come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word grows from the noun and verb 'band', which English absorbed in two related streams. One sense came from Old French 'bande', meaning a flat strip or a company of people, itself drawn from a Germanic root; the other, meaning a tie or bond, came through Old Norse 'band', a thing that binds, related to the verb 'bind'. By the late Middle Ages 'band' covered both a strip of material and a group of people held together by a common purpose. The form 'banded' simply adds the regular '-ed' ending, giving either the past tense 'they banded together' or the adjective 'banded', meaning marked with stripes or hoops. The shared idea of binding runs through all of it, which is why a wedding 'band', a rubber 'band', and a 'band' of travellers all trace back to the notion of holding things together.

How the word is built

• band (a strip, hoop, or group)
• -ed (past tense / adjectival suffix)