durance vile

durance vile (uncountable)

1. (archaic, idiomatic) A long prison sentence.
   • 1794, Robert Burns, Epistle from Esopus to Maria:

     In durance vile here must I wake and weep

   • 1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 74:

     Two of the tribe were captured and put in irons, Binmook and Tommy, whose photographs, taken when in durance vile, I have by me still.

   • 1994 February 19, The Canberra Times, page 15, column 3:

     That is, Messrs Brown and Hinton would have been in durance vile before the issue could be litigated: the High Court does not give advisory decisions.

• delivraunce