enmity

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Middle English enemyte, from Old French enemisté, ennemistié, from Late Latin, Vulgar Latin *inimīcitās, *inimīcitātem, from Latin inimīcus (“enemy”); cognates: French inimitié, Portuguese inimizade, Spanish enemistad. Equivalent to enemy +‎ -ity.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɛn.mɪ.ti/, (proscribed) /ˈɛm.nɪ.ti/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɛn.mɪ.ti/, (proscribed) /ˈɛm.nɪ.ti/

• Audio (US)

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Noun

enmity (countable and uncountable, plural enmities)

1. The quality of being an enemy; hostile or unfriendly disposition.
   • 2005, Plato, translated by Lesley Brown, Sophist, page 242e:

     Some later Muses from Ionia and Sicily reckoned it safest to weave together both versions and say that that which is both many and one, held together by both enmity and amity.

2. A state or feeling of opposition, hostility, hatred or animosity.
   • 1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm , London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC:

     I merely repeat, remember always your duty of enmity towards Man and all his ways.

Quotations

• 1611, The Holy Bible,  (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Genesis 3:15, column 1:

  And I will put enmitie betweene thee and the woman, and betweene thy ſeed and her ſeed: it ſhal bruiſe thy head, and thou ſhalt bruiſe his heele.

Synonyms

Antonyms

• amity

Translations

References

• “enmity”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “enmity”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• Notes:

Anagrams

• Minety