duty

From Middle English duete, from Old French deu (“due”), past participle of devoir (“to owe”), from Latin debere (“to owe”), from de (“from”) + habere (“to have”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈdjuːti/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /duːti/

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• Rhymes: -uːti
• Homophone: doody (for some speakers)

duty (countable and uncountable, plural duties)

1. That which one is morally or legally obligated to do.

   We don't have a duty to keep you here.

   • 1805, 21 October, Horatio Nelson

     England expects that every man will do his duty.

   • 1910, Emerson Hough, chapter I, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, OCLC 639762314, page 0105:

     Captain Edward Carlisle […] felt a curious sensation of helplessness seize upon him as he met her steady gaze, […]; he could not tell what this prisoner might do. He cursed the fate which had assigned such a duty, cursed especially that fate which forced a gallant soldier to meet so superb a woman as this under handicap so hard.

   • 1959, Georgette Heyer, chapter 1, in The Unknown Ajax:

     Charles had not been employed above six months at Darracott Place, but he was not such a whopstraw as to make the least noise in the performance of his duties when his lordship was out of humour.

   • 2013 August 10, Lexington, “Keeping the mighty honest”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:

     British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.

2. The state of being at work and responsible for or doing a particular task.

   I’m on duty from 6 pm to 6 am.

3. A tax placed on imports or exports; a tariff.

   customs duty; excise duty

4. (obsolete) One's due, something one is owed; a debt or fee.
   • 1526, William Tyndale, trans. Bible, Matthew XX:

     Take that which is thy duty, and goo thy waye.

5. (obsolete) Respect; reverence; regard; act of respect; homage.
   • William Shakespeare (c.1564–1616)

     my duty to you

6. The efficiency of an engine, especially a steam pumping engine, as measured by work done by a certain quantity of fuel; usually, the number of pounds of water lifted one foot by one bushel of coal (94 lbs. old standard), or by 1 cwt. (112 lbs., England, or 100 lbs., United States).

• Adjectives often used with "duty": public, private, moral, legal, social, double, civic, contractual, political, judicial, etc.

• (that which one is obligated to do): obligation

• duty-free (taxes)
• (that which one is obligated to do): right

• due

• duty in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• duty in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• duty at OneLook Dictionary Search

• IPA^(key): [ˈdutɨ]

duty

1. past passive participle of duś