means A unit of currency used in Britain and several other nations, originally equal to a pound weight of silver; also the verb for striking something hard and repeatedly, and an enclosure for stray animals.

from The money sense comes from Latin 'libra pondo' — 'a pound by weight' — where 'pondo' means 'by weight,' giving us both the word 'pound' and the abbreviation 'lb.' Old English took it as 'pund.' The currency was literally a pound of silver, which is why the symbol £ is a stylized 'L' for 'libra.' The verb 'to pound' (to beat) traces to a separate Old English root, 'punian,' while the animal 'pound' (an enclosure) comes from Old English 'pundfald,' possibly related to the idea of penning or shutting in — three words that drifted into the same spelling from different homes.