dignity

Definition from Wiktionary, a free dictionary

Contents 1 English 1.1 Etymology 1.2 Pronunciation 1.3 Noun 1.3.1 Synonyms 1.3.2 Related terms 1.3.3 Translations 1.3.4 See also 1.3.5 References 1.4 Anagrams

[edit] English

Wikipedia

[edit] Etymology

From Middle English dignitee < Old French dignite < Latin dignitas (“‘worthiness, merit, dignity, grandeur, authority, rank, office’”) < dignus (“‘worthy, appropriate’”), probably akin to decus (“‘honor, esteem’”) and decet (“‘it is fitting’”).

[edit] Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈdɪgnəti/, SAMPA: /"dIgn@ti/
•  Audio (US)^{help, file}

[edit] Noun

dignity (plural dignities)

1. A quality or state worthy of esteem and respect, especially humanness, but also, for example, augustness, nobility, majesty, grandeur, glory, superiority, wonderfulness
   • 1752, Henry Fielding, Amelia, I. viii

     He uttered this ... with great majesty, or, as he called it, dignity.

   • 1981, African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, art. 5

     Every individual shall have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being.

   • 2008, Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology (ECNH) [Switzerland]

     'The dignity of living beings with regard to plants: Moral consideration of plants for their own sake', 3: ... the ECNH has been expected to make proposals from an ethical perspective to concretise the constitutional term dignity of living beings with regard to plants.^[1]

2. decorum, formality, stateliness;
   • 1934, Aldous Huxley, "Puerto Barrios", in Beyond the Mexique Bay:

     Official DIGNITY tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the office is held.^[2]

3. high office or rank;
   • 1781, Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, F. III. 231:

     He ... distributed the civil and military dignities among his favourites and followers.

[edit] Synonyms

• worth
• worthiness

[edit] Related terms

• dignified
• dignify

[edit] Translations

[edit] See also

• affirmation
• integrity
• self-respect
• self-esteem
• self-worth

[edit] References

• Notes:

1. ^ Dignity of Plants
2. ^ Columbia World of Quotations 1996.

• dignity in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• dignity in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911

[edit] Anagrams

• Anagrams of dgiinty
• tidying