Bound and be damned

Posted by Smokey Stover on March 29, 2006

In Reply to: Bound and be damned posted by Smokey Stover on March 29, 2006

: : What is the origin of the phrase "bound and be damned".

: I googled just "and be damned," pretty much knowing what I would get. And I did.

: From quotationspage.com I got: "Publish and be damned!
: Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, Attributed; when the courtesan Harriette Wilson threatened to publish her memoirs and his letters." SS

Where does the "bound" come from? I know not, but there is an idiom, "I'll be bound," rather old-fashioned and not related to "be damned," but for what it's worth, this is the take of OED: "[bind] colloq. I dare, or will be bound: I undertake the responsibility of the statement, I feel certain. [citations] 1557 NORTH Gueuara's Diall Pr. 399b, I dare be bound..he shal not want infinit troubles. 1589 Theses Martinianæ Introd., Ile bee bounde hee shall not loose his labour...." And so on to our times, more or less. SS