to hold up
28
5.8
- phrasal verb
- /hoʊld ʌp/
- NSFW
:
atracar
- As soon as we get well, we're going to hold up that bank.
- hold up at gunpoint
- hold up a store
- hold up a bank
So if you say you've you've held somebody up and took their wallet, that's stealing, right?
- So if you say you've you've held somebody up and took their wallet, that's stealing, right?
- And when we held him up, he said all, all I saw was a big black gun.
- So her plan was to break in here, hold them up, take the money and go, you know what I mean?
- Might be that you're you're being held up, you know, like maybe you're being held up at gunpoint.
Examples
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Authorities reported that a masked man held up a convenience store with a gun last night.
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The armed robber threatened the cashier and demanded that she hold up the money in the register.
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So her plan was to break in here, hold them up, take the money and go, you know what I mean?
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One time, they even stopped a guy who tried to hold me up.
Academic text (1994) -
- The bank was held up by two men in space suits.
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The Kelly Gang had been holding up banks for as long as, well, for as long as there'd been banks.
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But then the robbers track Ellen down, hold her up at gunpoint, and kidnap her.
Blog text (10) -
During the investigation, police revealed that several suspects had held up various banks before their capture.
Synonyms
5
8.4
To rob a person or shop by threatening them with a weapon
How Serious
Surface Forms
Morphology
hold + up
The meaning 'to rob (at gunpoint)' cannot be predicted from the literal senses of 'hold' and 'up' — there is no clear compositional relation that leads to 'rob'. The particle 'up' here contributes to an idiomatic phrasal-verb sense (distinct from literal senses like 'raise' or 'delay'), so a B1 learner who only knows the constituents would very likely not infer the robbery meaning.
Etymology
Hold up meaning 'rob' comes from the image of a thief holding someone up at gunpoint, stopping them and taking their money, so the phrase means 'rob'.