victory

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See also: Victory

English[edit]

WOTD – 19 December 2022

Pronunciation[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

The noun is derived from Middle English victory, victori, victorie (“supremacy, victory; a defeat or vanquishing, conquest; superior military force; might, power, strength; triumphal celebration or procession; monument commemorating a defeat; superior position, dominance; mastery; moral victory, vindication; success, triumph; redemption, salvation; resurrection of Jesus; means of achieving spiritual victory; reward for or token of perseverance in a spiritual struggle”) [and other forms],[1] borrowed from Anglo-Norman victorie and Old French victorie, a variant of victoire (“victory, win”) (modern French victoire), from Latin victōria (“victory”), from victor (“champion, winner, victor; conqueror, vanquisher”)[2] (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *weyk- (“to contain, envelop; to overcome”)) + -ia (suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). The English word is analysable as victor +‎ -y (suffix forming abstract nouns denoting a condition, quality, or state), and displaced Middle English siȝe, sye.

The interjection is derived from the noun.[2]

cognates

Noun[edit]

victory (countable and uncountable, plural victories)

  1. (uncountable) The condition or state of having won a battle or competition, or having succeeded in an effort; (countable) an instance of this.
    Synonyms: triumph, win
    Antonyms: defeat, loss
    It was a great victory on the battlefield.
  2. (Roman mythology) Alternative letter-case form of Victory (“(uncountable) the Roman goddess of victory, the counterpart of the Greek goddess Nike; also (countable), an artistic depiction of her, chiefly as a winged woman”)
    • 1841, M. A. Titmarsh [pseudonym; William Makepeace Thackeray], “Mr. Titmarsh to Miss Smith on the Second Funeral of Napoleon. Letter III. The Funeral Ceremony.”, in The Second Funeral of Napoleon: […] And The Chronicle of the Drum. […], London: Hugh Cunningham, […], →OCLC, page 63:
      All along the Champs Elysées were […] statues of plaster representing nymphs, triumphs, victories, and other female personages painted in oil so as to represent marble; real marble could have had no better effect, and the appearance of the whole was lively and picturesque in the extreme.
Alternative forms[edit]
Derived terms[edit]
Related terms[edit]
Descendants[edit]
  • → Maori: wikitōriatanga
Translations[edit]
alternative letter-case form of Victory — see Victory

Interjection[edit]

victory

  1. Used to encourage someone to achieve success, or to celebrate a success or triumph.
Translations[edit]

Etymology 2[edit]

From Middle English victorien (“to overcome, vanquish”),[3] from Old French victorier, or from Medieval Latin victōriāre, from Latin victōria (noun);[4] see further at etymology 1.

cognates

Verb[edit]

victory (third-person singular simple present victories, present participle victorying, simple past and past participle victoried)

  1. (transitive, obsolete or rare) To defeat or triumph over (someone or something).
    • 1639, John Welles, “Of Mortification”, in The Soules Progresse to the Celestiall Canaan, or Heavenly Jerusalem. […], London: […] E[dward] G[riffin] and are to be sold by Henry Shephard […], →OCLC, 2nd part, page 245:
      [W]hen ſin got the upper hand of us, and vvee victoried by them; vve vvere then their ſervants, their ſlave: vvhen vvee overcome and have victoried them; let us make them our ſlaves perpetually; let us bind them in chaines, caſt them in priſon, and for ever utterly deſtroy their evill povver: […]
    • 1663, Edward Waterhous [i.e., Edward Waterhouse], chapter XLVIII, in Fortescutus Illustratus; or A Commentary on that Nervous Treatise De Laudibus Legum Angliæ, Written by Sir John Fortescue Knight, […], London: […] Tho[mas] Roycroft for Thomas Dicas […], →OCLC, page 517:
      [The game of dice and ball] is near of kin, in the nature of the vvord to that game of Cock-all, vvhich boyes uſe amongſt us, vvhich Cock-all, is as much vvin and take all, as a Cock does vvho victorying, has not onely the praiſe of all, but vvins all thats laied on the match by the Abettors againſt him.

References[edit]

  1. ^ “victōrī(e, n.(1)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 “victory, n.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, December 2022; “victory, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
  3. ^ “victōrīen, v.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  4. ^ “† victory, v.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, December 2020.

Further reading[edit]

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