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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

contraband.

Any goods which are illicit or illegal to possess.

10 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈkɒn.tɹəˌbænd/UK/ˈkɑn.tɹəˌbænd/US
  1. Any goods which are illicit or illegal to possess.

    uncountable · usually
  2. Goods which are prohibited from being traded, smuggled goods.

    uncountable · usually
  3. A black slave during the American Civil War who had escaped to, or been captured by, Union forces.

    US · countable · historical · usually
Where this word comes from

From Spanish contrabanda (modern spelling contrabando), from Italian contrabando (modern spelling contrabbando), from contra (“against”) + bando (“ban”), and reinforced by French contrebande.

adj/ˈkɒn.tɹəˌbænd/UK/ˈkɑn.tɹəˌbænd/US
  1. Prohibited from being traded.

Where this word comes from

From Spanish contrabanda (modern spelling contrabando), from Italian contrabando (modern spelling contrabbando), from contra (“against”) + bando (“ban”), and reinforced by French contrebande.

verb/ˈkɒn.tɹəˌbænd/UK/ˈkɑn.tɹəˌbænd/US
  1. To import illegally; to smuggle.

    obsolete
  2. To declare prohibited; to forbid.

    obsolete
Where this word comes from

From Spanish contrabanda (modern spelling contrabando), from Italian contrabando (modern spelling contrabbando), from contra (“against”) + bando (“ban”), and reinforced by French contrebande.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.