FRATERNITY • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Fraternity

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/frətˈərnəti/ /frətˈərnɪti/ Listen

noun

Fraternity n. (pl. fraternities)

The state or quality of being fraternal or brotherly; brotherhood.

A body of men associated for their common interest, business, or pleasure; a company; a brotherhood; a society; in the Roman Catholic Church, an association for special religious purposes, for relieving the sick and destitute, etc.

Men of the same class, profession, occupation, character, or tastes. "With what terms of respect knaves and sots will speak of their own fraternity!"

A social club for male college undergraduates. They often have secret initiation rites, and are named by the use of two or three Greek letters. The corresponding association for women students is called a sorority.

Synonyms: frat.

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Etymology of 'Fraternity'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Fraternity" Quotes from Famous Books

... place, which was nearer to the person of the bailiff than the one he had just quitted, and insomuch the more honorable, with the usual thanks, but with a simplicity which proved that he understood the compliment to be due to the fraternity of which he was a member, and not to himself. This little disposition made, as well as all other preliminary matters properly observed, the bailiff seemed satisfied with himself and his arrangements, for ...

— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper

... Giuseppe del Gesu, his labels having the cypher IHS upon them. It is not known why he adopted this monogram, which is that of the Jesuits. It is possible that he belonged to a fraternity in Cremona, common at that period among Italian tradesmen, who banded themselves together in various societies bearing ...

— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart

... missionary fraternity was sitting quietly among the trees. It was an August morning. The air was a living splendor, clear and warm, with now and then a breeze that rippled the leaves like ...

— The Log School-House on the Columbia • Hezekiah Butterworth

... the first-floor of the house in which we dwelt, there also resided one Stubbs and his wife. They had neither chick nor child. Stubbs was a tailor by trade, and being a first-rate workman, earned weekly a considerable sum; but, like too many of his fraternity, he was seldom sober from Saturday night until Wednesday morning. His loving spouse 'rowed in the same boat'—and the 'little green-bottle' was dispatched several times during the days of their Saturnalia, to be ...

— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour

... on him, and be was helpless in its grasp. But though he mixed with the crowds that thronged the gambling-hells, he was one of them only in the absorbing passion for play. There was a certain respect shown him by all that venturesome fraternity. He went to Frazer River during the gold excitement. In consequence of exposure and privation in that wild chase after gold, which proved fatal to so many eager adventurers, he contracted pulmonary disease, and came back to San Francisco to die. He had not a dollar. His gambler friend took charge ...

— California Sketches, Second Series • O. P. Fitzgerald

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