TIE UP • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Tie up

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/taɪ əp/ Listen

verb

Tie v. t. (past & past part. tied, obs. tight; pres. part. tying)

1.

To fasten with a band or cord and knot; to bind. "Tie the kine to the cart." "My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother: bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck."

2.

To form, as a knot, by interlacing or complicating a cord; also, to interlace, or form a knot in; as, to tie a cord to a tree; to knit; to knot. "We do not tie this knot with an intention to puzzle the argument."

3.

To unite firmly; to fasten; to hold. "In bond of virtuous love together tied."

4.

To hold or constrain by authority or moral influence, as by knotted cords; to oblige; to constrain; to restrain; to confine. "Not tied to rules of policy, you find Revenge less sweet than a forgiving mind."

5.

(Mus.) To unite, as notes, by a cross line, or by a curved line, or slur, drawn over or under them.

6.

To make an equal score with, in a contest; to be even with.

To ride and tie. See under Ride.

To tie down.

(a)

To fasten so as to prevent from rising.

(b)

To restrain; to confine; to hinder from action.

To tie up, to confine; to restrain; to hinder from motion or action.

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Etymology of 'Tie up'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tie up" Quotes from Famous Books

... furnish the receptacle for carriage. For small goods this invariably consists, as far as we can see, of a red bandanna handkerchief, so that purchases have to be small and frequent; not all of one sort, however, for the native can readily tie up his tea in one corner, his sugar and buttons in two others, and still have one left for normal uses. How many handkerchiefs a day are put to use may be judged from the fact that the average sale of tea at Upper Fort Garry is four large boxes daily—all, ...

— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce

... of throwing the shadows of Mysie Craig and George Balgarnie on the grass, where the fairies had left the traces of their dances? Questions these which she was unable to answer, if it were not even that she was afraid to put them to herself. Then, when was it that she felt herself unable to tie up her work in order to take it home, and that her mother, seeing the reacting effect of the prior sleepless nights in her languid frame, did this little duty for her, even as while she was doing it she looked through her tears at her changed daughter? But ...

— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various

... wave under the gaslight, the stuffs of various and tempting colours display their brittle and heavy folds, while the young ladies behind the counter, with their hair dressed tapering to a point and with a ribbon beneath their collar, tie up the article, little finger in the air, or fill bags of moire into which the sweets fall like a ...

— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet

... Barry Valentine patiently, "don't you keep this house clean enough ordinarily without these orgies of cleaning the minute anybody comes in? I never knew such a house for women to open windows, and tie up curtains, and put towels over their hair, and run around with buckets of cold suds. ...

— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris

... until I could offer you something with a bread-and-meat attachment in the way of day pay," wrote Ford, "and the chance has come. Kennedy, my track supervisor, has quit, and the place is yours if you will take it. If you are willing to tie up to the most harebrained scheme you ever heard of, with about one chance in a thousand of coming out on top and of growing up with a brand new country of unlimited possibilities, just gather up your dunnage ...

— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde

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