Etymology: substantive use of compound adj.: compare the parallel history of compost n.¹ Originally stressed on second syllable; so in H. More, and still dialectally; Shakespeare has both, but ˈcompound more frequently.

Etymology: Of disputed origin, but referred by Yule and Burnell, on weighty evidence, to Malay kampong, kampung (in Dutch orthog. kampoeng) ‘enclosure, space fenced in’; also ‘village, quarter of a town occupied by a particular nationality’, as the ‘Chinese kampong’ at Batavia. In this latter sense, campon occurs in a Portuguese writer of 1613. Earlier conjectures were that it was a corruption of Portuguese campanha or French campagne country, or of Portuguese campo field, camp. See Yule Anglo-Ind. Gloss. s.v.

Etymology: Originally past participle of compoune, compone (see compound v.), and so of 3 syllables, com-poun-ed, but already c1400 reduced to two; its participial character, which was thus obscured, was lost entirely after the verb became compound with past participle compounded.

Etymology: Middle English compoune-n , compowne-n (in 15th cent. also compone ), < Old French compon-re, -pondre, -pundre (present participle componant (-pondant ), 3rd plural present component ) = Provençal componre , -pondre , Italian componere , comporre < Latin compōnĕre to place or put together: see compone v. (Old French on gave Middle English oun , as in dragoun , lesoun , noun , soun .) The form compoun(e survived to c1575, and compound as past tense occurs even after 1600 (though it may then have been referred no longer to a verb compoun , but looked upon merely as short for compounded ); on the other hand, to compound(e is known at least as early as 1520. For the history of the final -d in compound , expound , propound , see expound v., which in all its forms occurred earlier in English, and was the type followed by compound . In this word the current use of the original past participle compouned , compound , as an adjective, would of itself tend to establish a verb to compound , as in to content , to direct , and the verbs referred to under -ate suffix³; compare also astound adj., astound v.