attach

Verb

attach (third-person singular simple present attaches, present participle attaching, simple past and past participle attached)

1. (transitive) To fasten, to join to (literally and figuratively).
   • You need to attach the carabiner to your harness.
   • An officer is attached to a certain regiment, company, or ship.

   Synonyms:

   connect, annex, affix, unite, accouple, assemble, associate, bewed, bind, clasp

   Antonyms:

   detach, unfasten, disengage, separate, decouple, disconnect, rip off, tear off, unconnect, uncouple

2. (intransitive) To adhere; to be attached.
   • The great interest which attaches to the mere knowledge of these facts cannot be doubted.1838, Henry Brougham, Political Philosophy

   Synonyms:

   cling, stick, adhere, bond, cleave, cohere, conglutinate, glue, hug, stick together

3. To include an attachment with a communication (especially an email or other electronic communication).
   • I've attached the contract to this email.
4. To come into legal operation in connection with anything; to vest.
   • Dower will attach.
   • it therefore becomes important to know at what time the lien for taxes will attach.1886, Thomas M. Cooley, A Treatise on the Law of Taxation
5. To win the heart of; to connect by ties of love or self-interest; to attract; to fasten or bind by moral influence; with to.
   • attached to a friend; attaching others to us by wealth or flattery
   • incapable of attaching a sensible man1811, [Jane Austen], Sense and Sensibility […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC
6. To connect, in a figurative sense; to ascribe or attribute; to affix; with to.
   • to attach great importance to a particular circumstance
   • Some of the guilt must attach to the parents.

   Synonyms:

   chalk up to, draw, impute, accredit, ascribe, attribute, charge, lay, put down to, repose

7. (obsolete) To take, seize, or lay hold of.
   • Then homeward every man attach the hand / Of his fair mistress.c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
8. (obsolete) To arrest, seize.
   • Eftsoones the Gard, which on his state did wait, / Attacht that faitor false, and bound him strait […]1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC
   • Old lord, I cannot blame thee, / Who am myself attach'd with weariness / To th' dulling of my spirits: sit down, and rest.1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published...