AU, CA, US, UK /əˈbæn.dən/ · UK, SC, WA /əˈban.dən/
Etymology
From Middle English abandounen, from Old French abandoner, formed from a (“at, to”) + bandon (“jurisdiction, control”), from Late Latin bannum (“proclamation”), bannus, bandum, from Frankish *ban, *bann, from Proto-Germanic *bannaną (“to proclaim, command”) (whence English ban), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to speak”). See also ban, banal. Displaced Middle English forleten (“to abandon”), from Old English forlǣtan, anforlǣtan; see forlet; and Middle English forleven (“to leave behind, abandon”), from Old English forlǣfan; see forleave. Compare typologically abdicate, Russian отказа́ться (otkazátʹsja) (akin to приказа́ть (prikazátʹ), сказа́ть (skazátʹ), указа́ть (ukazátʹ)).
To give up or relinquish control of, to surrender or to give oneself over, or to yield to one's emotions.
[…] he abandoned himself […] to his favourite vice.1856, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James II. Volume 3, page 312:
2
To desist in doing, practicing, following, holding, or adhering to; to turn away from; to permit to lapse; to renounce; to discontinue.
In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. […] The public realm is privatised, the regulations restraining the ultra–wealthy and the companies they control are abandoned, and Edwardian levels of inequality are almost fetishised.2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 23, page 19:
3
To leave behind; to desert, as in a ship, a position, or a person, typically in response to overwhelming odds or impending dangers; to forsake, in spite of a duty or responsibility.
Many baby girls have been abandoned on the streets of Beijing.
He was abandoned on the island with no one to help him.
2 more examples
She abandoned her husband for a new man.
Hope was overthrown, and yet could not be abandoned.1832, Isaac Taylor, Saturday Evening, page 3:
abdicate, jilt, leave in the lurch, leave somebody holding the bag, retire
abandon
noun
Etymology From Middle English abandoun, from Old French abandon, from Old French abondonner.
1
A yielding to natural impulses or inhibitions; freedom from artificial constraint, with loss of appreciation of consequences. (Now especially in the phrase with abandon.)
with gay abandon, with wild abandon, with reckless abandon
The Italian painters have an abandon in their chiar' oscuro which mellows up their flesh tints in a way that no other school can imitate : the frigidity of their outline is another remarkable feature, and the harmony of their impasto is unique.1846, The New Monthly Magazine and Universal Register, page 453:
3 more examples
I envy those chroniclers who assert with reckless but sincere abandon: 'I was there. I saw it happen. It happened thus.'1954, Gore Vidal, Messiah:
They needed to have an abandon in their performance that you just can’t get out of people in the middle of the night when they’re barefoot.2007 November 4, David M. Halbfinger, “The City That Never Sleeps, Comatose”, in The New York Times:
My dreams were largely based on the works of Dickens (his Mugby Junction stories), Thackeray (Jeames on the Gauge Question), and Arthur Conan Doyle, whose Sherlock Holmes stories I kept devouring with gluttonous abandon.2026 April 1, Vitali Vitaliev, “Literature on the track”, in RAIL, number 1058, page 68: