debt

Etymology

From Middle English dette, dett, borrowed from Old French dete (French dette), from Medieval Latin dēbita, from Latin dēbitum (“what is owed, a debt, a duty”), neuter of dēbitus, perfect passive participle of dēbeō (“I owe”), contraction of *dehibeō (“I have from”), from de (“from”) + habeō (“I have”). Doublet of debit. The unpronounced "b" in the modern English spelling is a Latinisation from the Latin etymon dēbitum.

noun

1. An action, state of mind, or object one has an obligation to perform for another, adopt toward another, or give to another.
   Revenge the jeering and disdain'd contempt / Of this proud king, who studies day and night / To answer all the debt he owes to you / Even with the bloody payment of your deaths. 1589, William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part I, act 1, scene 3
   This long debt of confidence, due from me to him, whose bane and ruin I have been, shall at length be paid. 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 14, in The Scarlet Letter
2. The state or condition of owing something to another.
   I am in your debt.
3. (finance) Money that one person or entity owes or is required to pay to another, generally as a result of a loan or other financial transaction.
   Bolsheviki had repudiated the four-billion-dollar debt which the government of the Tsar had contracted with the bankers. 1919, Upton Sinclair, chapter 15, in Jimmie Higgins
   Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so. Much of their pleading is public-relations bluster. 2013-06-22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70
   I don't own any stocks or bonds. All my money is tied up in debt. 2004, George Carlin, When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?, New York: Hyperion Books, →OCLC, →OL, page 213
4. (law) An action at law to recover a certain specified sum of money alleged to be due