Bandage

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈbændɪdÊ’/

Origin

Borrowing from fr bandage.

Full definition of bandage

Noun

1. A strip of gauze or similar material used to protect or support a wound or injury.
• 1883: Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island...he was deadly pale, and the blood-stained bandage round his head told that he had recently been wounded, and still more recently dressed.
2. A strip of cloth bound round the head and eyes as a blindfold.
• 1844: Alexander Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Count_of_Monte_Cristo/Chapter_75...the president informed him that one of the conditions of his introduction was that he should be eternally ignorant of the place of meeting, and that he would allow his eyes to be bandaged, swearing that he would not endeavor to take off the bandage.
• 1963, Margery Allingham, The China Governess Chapter 17, The face which emerged was not reassuring. It was blunt and grey, the nose springing thick and flat from high on the frontal bone of the forehead, whilst his eyes were narrow slits of dark in a tight bandage of tissue. â€¦.

Derived terms

• adhesive bandage
• compression bandage
• gauze bandage
• triangular bandage

Related terms

• dressing
• splint

Verb

1. To apply a bandage to something.
• 1879: Samuel Clemens (as Mark Twain), A Tramp Abroad, http://etext.virginia.edu/etcbin/ot2www-pubeng?specfile=/texts/english/modeng/publicsearch/modengpub.o2w&act=surround&offset=644473384&tag=Twain,+Mark,+1835-1910:+A+Tramp+Abroad,+1879&query=+bandaging&id=TwaTram...they ate...whilst they chatted, disputed and laughed. The door to the surgeon's room stood open, meantime, but the cutting, sewing, splicing, and bandaging going on in there in plain view did not seem to disturb anyone's appetite.