FEALTY • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Fealty

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/fˈiəlti/ /fˈilti/ Listen

noun

fealty n.

Fidelity to one's lord; the feudal obligation by which the tenant or vassal was bound to be faithful to his lord; the special oath by which this obligation was assumed; fidelity to a superior power, or to a government; loyalty. It is no longer the practice to exact the performance of fealty, as a feudal obligation.

Fidelity; constancy; faithfulness, as of a friend to a friend, or of a wife to her husband. "He should maintain fealty to God." "Makes wicked lightnings of her eyes, and saps The fealty of our friends." "Swore fealty to the new government." Note: Fealty is distinguished from homage, which is an acknowledgment of tenure, while fealty implies an oath. See Homage.

Synonyms: Homage; loyality; fidelity; constancy.

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Etymology of 'Fealty'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Fealty" Quotes from Famous Books

... 1592, the Governor received a letter from the Emperor of Japan demanding that an ambassador be sent to offer him the fealty of the Philippines. Juan Cobo, as the best speaker of Chinese, was chosen to represent the Spaniards, and he left Manila on July 29, 1592. After successfully convincing the Japanese Emperor of the amity of the Spaniards, he left ...

— Doctrina Christiana • Anonymous

... it all back in a secret drawer, something fell on the floor. He picked up the dainty boutonniere of pale sweet violets, and looked at it, while a frown darkened his countenance, as though he recognized some plenipotentiary pleading for fealty ...

— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... read much of the rest for ever. Of Moliere—surely the next greatest name of Christendom—I could tell a very similar story; but in a little corner of a little essay these princes are too much out of place, and I prefer to pay my fealty and pass on. How often I have read "Guy Mannering," "Rob Roy," or "Redgauntlet," I have no means of guessing, having begun young. But it is either four or five times that I have read "The Egoist," and either five or six that I have read the "Vicomte ...

— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... family who had travelled from Birmingham to Dudley every three weeks, to perform humble suit at the Lord's court, held that very court by royal appointment, to receive the fealty of others. ...

— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton

... Agostino, "to see how little these princes care for the true interests of religion and the service of God,—how little real fealty there is to ...

— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various

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