FEUDAL

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does feudal mean? 

• FEUDAL (adjective)
  The adjective FEUDAL has 1 sense:

1. of or relating to or characteristic of feudalism

  Familiarity information: FEUDAL used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FEUDAL (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Of or relating to or characteristic of feudalism

Classified under:

Relational adjectives (pertainyms)

Synonyms:

feudal; feudalistic

Pertainym:

feudalism (the social system that developed in Europe in the 8th century; vassals were protected by lords who they had to serve in war)

Derivation:

feudalism (the social system that developed in Europe in the 8th century; vassals were protected by lords who they had to serve in war)

 Context examples 

The protector had become the protected, and the whole fabric of the feudal system was tottering to a fall.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Something of his birthplace seemed to cling to the man, and I never looked at his pale, keen face or the poise of his head without associating him with grey archways and mullioned windows and all the venerable wreckage of a feudal keep.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The sulky dogs would rather have three twists of a rack, or the thumbikins for an hour, than pay out a denier for their own feudal father and liege lord.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Yet why should they build and strive, when the first adventurer who passed would set torch to their thatch, and when their own feudal lord would wring from them with blows and curses the last fruits of their toil?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The highway had lain through the swelling vineyard country, which stretched away to the north and east in gentle curves, with many a peeping spire and feudal tower, and cluster of village houses, all clear cut and hard in the bright wintry air.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Above all, the owner of the soil could still hold his head high as the veritable Socman of Minstead—that is, as holding the land in free socage, with no feudal superior, and answerable to no man lower than the king.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

During three hundred years their domains had gradually contracted, sometimes through royal or feudal encroachment, and sometimes through such gifts to the Church as that with which Alleyne's father had opened the doors of Beaulieu Abbey to his younger son.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

With enchanting murmurs Daisy admired this aspect or that of the feudal silhouette against the sky, admired the gardens, the sparkling odor of jonquils and the frothy odor of hawthorn and plum blossoms and the pale gold odor of kiss-me-at-the-gate.

(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)