refrain

Refrain comes through Old French refraindre or refrener, words of checking, curbing, and holding back. Behind them stands Latin refringere, "to break back" or "check," and in part the influence of frenum, "bridle." The early idea was restraint, not song. The word belonged to control before it belonged to repetition.

English took refrain in the 14th century as a verb meaning "to abstain" or "hold oneself back." That sense remains alive in formal and everyday speech. At the same time, French poetic practice gave English a noun refrain for a repeated line or burden in verse. The two senses met through the idea of recurring return and checking movement.

By the later Middle Ages, songs with repeating lines were common across France and England. The refrain in a ballad or lyric marked the place where the voice came back to familiar words. Repetition made memory easier and performance more communal. A word of restraint became a word of return.

Modern English keeps both branches. As a verb, to refrain is to stop oneself; as a noun, a refrain is a repeated phrase in song or poem. The split is not accidental, because both senses involve a turning back. One is self-control, the other is patterned recurrence.