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Fealty   Listen
noun
fealty  n.  
1.
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.
2.
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.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Fealty" Quotes from Famous Books



... Meseritz, declare, vow, and swear to the most powerful, noble, and brave Otto von Bork, lord of the lands and castles of Labes, Pansin, Stramehl, Regenwalde, and others, and my most powerful feudal lord, and to his lawful heirs, a right loyal fealty, to serve him with all duty and obedience, to warn him of all evil, and defend him from all injury, to the best of ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold

... all the rest of his life, if he escapes alive from the battle-field where his chief needed his help. To defend him, the chief; to guard his person; to reckon up one's own brave deeds as enhancing his glory: this is the henchman's one great oath of fealty.[30] The chiefs fight for victory, the henchmen for their chief. If the state in which they are born should be growing sluggish through ease and a long peace, most of the noble young men seek of their own accord those nations which are then waging war, both because a quiet life is hateful ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin

... which he told me he found very "troublesome," and that he had expended much valuable time and attention on some of the most difficult portions, which he very soon afterwards found to be utterly obsolete, particularly mentioning those concerning "homage," "fealty," "knight-service," "wardship," &c. The above may seem a great undertaking for vacant hours at college, but will not appear to any of Mr. Smith's friends to have been such to him, who read as rapidly, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various

... wholesome fealty to his wife, was doubting, the door flew open, and in marched Carroway and all his men, or at least all save one of his present following. He had ordered his pinnace to meet him here, himself having ridden from Scarborough, and the pinnace had brought the jolly-boat ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... person, gave him a long look compounded equally of admiration and pity, but Niafer did not dispute the matter. Instead, these two pledged constant fealty until they should have rescued ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell

... emperor. Yet when it was now manifest that Nero was dead, the soldiers pressed him hard to it, and one of the tribunes, entering his tent with his drawn sword, bade him either take the government or that. But after Fabius Valens, having the command of one legion, had first sworn fealty to Galba, and letters from Rome came with tidings of the resolves of the senate, at last with much ado he persuaded the army to declare Galba emperor. And when Flaccus Hordeonius came by Galba's commission as his successor, he handed over to him his forces, and ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... seems to excite all three of you," he said, "and though we ask you the question pro forma, it is not absolutely necessary that we should know from whence you come. We require your names, and your oath of fealty; but before binding yourselves, I will read you our laws, and the rules of membership for this society; rules to which, if you join us, you ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... segments of which nations at first consist, lose their separate external and internal structures in a similar manner. In feudal times the minor communities, governed by feudal lords, were severally organized in the same rude way, and were held together only by the fealty of their respective rulers to a suzerain. But along with the growth of a central power, the demarcations of these local communities become relatively unimportant, and their separate organizations merge into the general organization. ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer

... the Second went to Ireland. All the archbishops and bishops of Ireland met him at Waterford, received him as king and lord of Ireland, vowing loyal obedience to him and his successors, and acknowledging fealty to them forever. These prelates were followed by the kings of Cork, Limerick, Ossory, Meath, and by Reginald of Waterford. Roderick O'Connor, King of Connaught, joined them in 1175. All these accepted Henry the Second of England as their Lord and King, ...
— A Straight Deal - or The Ancient Grudge • Owen Wister

... support to his grandmother. He had pledged his fealty to her and he felt grateful that she leaned upon him as slowly she mounted the four steps which led ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake

... heard all that had thus taken place (he was then in the King William's court, because his father had given him as a hostage to our king's father, and so he lived here afterwards), he came to the king, and did such fealty as the king required at his hands; and so with his permission went to Scotland, with all the support that he could get of English and French, and deprived his uncle Dufenal of the kingdom, and was received as king. But the Scots afterwards gathered some force ...
— The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle • Unknown

... to the letter? Christ's goodness, then—does that fare better? Strange goodness, which upon the score Of being goodness, the mere due Of man to fellow-man, much more To God,—should take another view Of its possessor's privilege, And bid him rule his race! You pledge Your fealty to such rule? What, all— From heavenly John and Attic Paul, And that brave weather-battered Peter, Whose stout faith only stood completer For buffets, sinning to be pardoned, As, more his hands hauled nets, they hardened,— All, down to you, the ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke

... not born of whispered secrets or of relations, however delicate and awestruck, with other hearts, but a stern uncompromising thing, that seemed a relation with something quite apart from man, a Power swift and vehement and often terrible, to whom one owed an unmistakable fealty in thought and act. Righteousness! That old-fashioned thing on which the Jews, one was taught, set much store, which one had misconceived as something born of piety and ceremony, and which now revealed itself as a ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson

... — N. duty, what ought to be done, moral obligation, accountableness[obs3], liability, onus, responsibility; bounden duty, imperative duty; call, call of duty; accountability. allegiance, fealty, tie engagement &c. (promise) 768; part; function, calling &c. (business) 625. morality,, morals, decalogue; case of conscience; conscientiousness &c. (probity) 939; conscience, inward monitor, still small voice within, sense of duty, tender conscience, superego; the hell within [P. L.]. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget

... he was a Scotchman, but he denied the inference made from it,—that he was a "state criminal." He wrote: "It cannot have escaped the attention of Your High Mightinesses that every man now giving fealty to the cause of American Independence was born a British subject." If he were a "state criminal," then, he argued, General Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and all other American patriots were also ...
— Paul Jones • Hutchins Hapgood

... not do it I will,' said she. And she called the twelve foster brothers and made them vow fealty to herself. So Manus was left with no man, and sorrowful was he when he returned alone to Old Bergen. It was late when his foot touched the shore, and took the path towards the forest. On his way there met him a man in a ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various

... valet. He came from his Majesty to inform Blomberg that the regent could not spare Sir Wolf Hartschwert, and the captain might choose another companion for his ride. The Emperor expected him to select only a loyal, trustworthy, and vigorous nobleman who had taken the oath of fealty to his Majesty. If he should be in the military service, the necessary leave of absence was granted in advance; only he must present himself to the Lord Bishop of Arras that very day. Sir Wolf Hartschwert must depart for Brussels in the regent's ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... put 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 to ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... stupefaction. But at last, one of their number, an elderly man, advanced, and prostrated himself on the rich carpet spread in front of the dais, thus rendering public homage to his rightful king. 'Jai, jai, jai!' shouted the mob, and soon a dozen others among the nobles had given the pledge of fealty. ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell

... temptation came in the shape of presents from that man, I could not resist—I was too weak. I listened to his insidious persuasion, and tried to make myself believe that I was guiltless, as I owned no fealty to King George. But I am justly punished, and never again will I allow myself to be made an accessory ...
— Cutlass and Cudgel • George Manville Fenn

... while I investigate. The Democratic creed doth only know Complete submission on the henchman's part To him who momentary at the helm Doth guide the ship of state through calm and storm. To think in words, disloyalty proclaims; But act subservient fealty do prove. (Exit Printus) Quezox: Most noble Sire, thy courage I admire But Somnolent doth wait without the door. Francos: Ha! He doth quickly to my call respond, But bid him enter. I will quick despatch The matter which thy ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)

... condottieri. The Grand Inquisitor maintained a bodyguard of fifty mounted Familiars and two hundred infantry; his subordinates were allowed ten horsemen and fifty archers apiece. Where these black guards appeared, city gates were opened; magistrates swore fealty to masters of more puissance than the king; the resources of flourishing districts were placed at their disposal. Their arbitrary acts remained unquestioned, their mysterious sentences irreversible. Shrouded in secrecy, amenable to no jurisdiction but their own, they reveled ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... character should be incidental rather than primary. I will only add at present that, fully appreciating the magnitude of the subject and solicitous that the Atlantic and Pacific shores of the Republic may be bound together by inseparable ties of common interest, as well as of common fealty and attachment to the Union, I shall be disposed, so far as my own action is concerned, to follow the lights of the Constitution as expounded and illustrated by those whose opinions and expositions constitute the standard of my political faith ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Franklin Pierce • Franklin Pierce

... interested parties before some new holocaust has added to the number of those who have already fallen victims. Others who know the facts, well-meaning editors of leading journals of so-called communistic anarchism, may, from a sense of mistaken party fealty, bear longer the fearful responsibility of silence, if they will; for one I will not, cannot. I will take the other responsibility of exposure, which responsibility I personally and entirely assume, although the step is taken after conference ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter

... brought up from infancy." On the other hand, Henry of Conde, in no way abashed,[1009] declared "that he could not believe that his royal cousin intended to violate a promise confirmed by so solemn an oath. As to fealty, he had always been an obedient subject of the king, and would ever be. Touching his religion, if the king had given him the exercise of its worship, God had given him the knowledge of it; and to Him he must needs ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird

... Blood-dropping daggers shall achieve The dateless doom of Atreus' name, Or? kindling torch and joyful flame In sign of new-won liberty? Once more Orestes shall retrieve His father's wealth, and, throned on high, Shall hold the city's fealty. So mighty is the grasp whereby, Heaven-holpen, he shall trip and throw, Unseconded, a double ...
— The House of Atreus • AEschylus

... thought of her affections ever changing. He knew that she was his—heart, soul, everything. For had she not given him every earnest of it, befriended him through weal and through woe? Nor had he need to assure her that her love was reciprocated, or his fealty still unfaltering; for their faith, as their reliance, was mutual. His letter, therefore, was less that of a lover to his mistress than one between man and man, written to a fellow-conspirator, most of it in figurative phrase, even some of ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... of Vipont was a courtier, married a beauty, got the Garter again, and, for the first time, became the fashion. Fashion began to be a power. In the reign of James II. the House of Vipont again contrived to be a minor, who came of age just in time to take the oaths of fealty to William and Mary. In case of accidents, the House of Vipont kept on friendly terms with the exiled Stuarts, but it wrote no letters, and got into no scrapes. It was not, however, till the Government, under Sir Robert ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... said at last, when she had reminded him of her question. "Without cause I had made no vow. Canst thou not trust thy knight? And of my fealty, so solemnly sworn, Caterina knoweth naught. It is for me and thee alone—and least of all for the ear of Venice. But thou knowest—if it were no more than that the way of a crown be not easy for a young and guileless maid—some one of ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... Ivan, "he is not a pretender, of that I am convinced, and you will be soon. He is the descendant of our own King James VI. (whose mother was bonnie Queen Mary), and you paid fealty at Holyrood many years ago to King James. My bonnie Prince Chairlie should by rights be sitting on the throne of Scotland, aye, and of England too, and, by the help of Heaven and our guid Scotch laddies, he will ...
— Marie Gourdon - A Romance of the Lower St. Lawrence • Maud Ogilvy

... came, on the first day of August, to Salisbury, and there came to him his wise men [i.e., counselors], and all the landowning men of property there were over all England, whosesoever men they were; and all bowed down to him and became his men, and swore oaths of fealty to him that they would be faithful to him against ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson

... length many of them believed that they had entered into a league with the devil, that they had been transported by him through the air to an assembly of souls consigned to everlasting reprobation, that they had bound themselves in acts of fealty to their infernal taskmasters [Errata: read taskmaster], and had received from him in return the gift of performing superhuman and supernatural feats. This is a tremendous state of degradation of what Milton called the "the faultless proprieties of nature," [192] which cooler thinking ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin

... for whom to fight—a king to love, revere, obey—a king from whose hand knighthood were an honor, precious as life itself, and there are noble hearts enough to swear fealty to him, and bright swords ready to defend his throne," said the young heir of Buchan, as he brandished his own weapon above his head, and then rested his arms upon its broad hilt, despondingly. "But where is that king? Men speak of my most gentle kinsman Sir John ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... way of wealth to many of the race. It has honored thousands by places of trust, honor and profit; it has been the means of developing the latent abilities of the village Hampdens, Pitts, Gladstones, Websters, Clays and Calhouns. It has been the means of demonstrating fealty to party, and to country. For this a glorious apostrophe is due those who have proven no cravens at any stage of the race's career. If there were but that picture on which to look, the occasion of this very lecture would ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various

... the worship of God, go back to their idols. When a man professes faith in Christ on communion-day, with the sacramental cup in his hand, he swears allegiance to the Lord God Almighty, and says, "Let all my idols perish!" but how many of us have forsaken our fealty to God, and have gone back ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage

... How you talk. And you consider then that if a husband be not master of his wife's heart, he has no right to her fealty; if a wife ceases to love, she may cease to be true. Is that your doctrine on this matter, as a minister ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... When he smote Virginia, the non-resistants, the anti-slavery men, learned a lesson. They saw what was necessary to the accomplishment of their work, and were now ready for the "worst." He rebuked the conservatism of the North, and gave an example of adherence to duty, devotion to truth, and fealty to God and man that make the mere "professor" to tremble with shame. "John Brown's body lies mouldering in the clay," but his immortal name will be pronounced with blessings in all lands and by all people till ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams

... brute soul cried out to him, telling him how he had waited and watched for this master he knew would come, how he would fight for him, how he wanted to lie down and put his great head on the white man's feet in token of his fealty. But Wapi's bloodshot eyes and battle-scarred face failed to reveal what was in him, and Blake—following the instructions of those who should know—ruled him from the beginning with a club that was more brutal than the club ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood

... their places with Democrats? If Mr. Hayes, with whom the Reformers have been at least partially satisfied, had succeeded to a Democratic administration, can it be doubted that he would have made a similar change in favor of the Republicans? Is not every President bound by fealty to his party, consequently by a regard for his honor and reputation, to perpetuate a system which the true aim of Reform ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various

... much gold to Curigalzu ... of Curigalzu, the quantity thereof increased in the palace ... so, because he heard the Kings (or great men) who gave advice, thus the gold ... the Kings, brotherhood, and good-will, peace, and fealty ... the ... increased the silver, increased ...
— Egyptian Literature

... superintendence. At length the country, once again favored, was subjected to the invasion of Alexander. After the fall of Tyre, the conqueror advanced to Gaza, and totally destroyed it. He then approached Jerusalem, in fealty to Persia. The high priest made no resistance, but went forth in his pontifical robes, followed by the people in white garments, to meet the mighty warrior. Alexander, probably encouraged by the prophesies ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord

... likewise, and asked for peace. The clans, it is said, rejoiced thereat, having no wish for a war which could buy them neither spoil nor land. Malcolm sent ambassadors to William, and took that oath of fealty to the "Basileus of Britain," which more than one Scottish king and kinglet had taken before,—with the secret proviso (which, during the Middle Ages, seems to have been thoroughly understood in such cases by both parties), that he should be William's man just as long as William could ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... by name, each of them in return pledging him—the better sort in French claret, the lower class in husky (whisky)." Here also the drinking of wine together perhaps implied the renewal of a pledge of fealty and protection between the chief and his clansmen, all of whom were held to be of his kin. The belief in the kinship of the whole clan existed among the Rajputs exactly as in the Scotch clans. In speaking of the Rathors Colonel Tod states that they ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell

... or 12 miles distant. We were very anxious that their cattle and sheep, of which they had a large number, should not go to the enemy, but we could bring no charge of treachery home to them, as they were very smooth-tongued scoundrels and always swore fealty to us. ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen

... omnipresent and omnipotent in civilized Europe. Its clergy and orders swarmed in every place, all sworn to guard it at every point on peril of their souls, and themselves held sacred in person and retreat from all reach of law for any crime save lack of fealty to the great autocracy.[1] The money, the armies, the lands, the legislatures, the judges, the executives, the police, the schools, with the whole ecclesiastical administration, reaching even to the most private affairs of life, were under its control. And at its centre ...
— Luther and the Reformation: - The Life-Springs of Our Liberties • Joseph A. Seiss

... picked men, and I looked them over and exulted. Erect and clean-limbed, they were as dignified and wonderful as a row of fir trees, and physically I felt a sorry object beside them. Yet they hailed me as leader, and placing me on a robe of deerskins carried me into camp. They smoked the pipe of fealty with me, and when I slept that night I knew that my dream castles of the last two years were at last shaping into something I could touch and handle. Their glitter was giving ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith

... Religion, especially in the earlier forms of society, though not only in them, has been a pedagogue to lead men to the acknowledgment of the supremacy of the moral law. It differs from other such guides in the tone of mingled humility and enthusiasm that it gives to this fealty. ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy

... boat in Caesar's rear, Flames—No return through me! So put the torch to ties though dear, If ties but tempters be. Nor cringe if come the night: Walk through the cloud to meet the pall, Though light forsake thee, never fall From fealty to light. ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville

... "My father was King, his father also was King. I have worn the crown forty years from my cradle; you have all sworn fealty to me as your sovereign, and your fathers did the like to my fathers. How, then, can my claim be disputed?" After a long controversy, a compromise was effected. Henry agreed that if he were left in peaceable ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... number of subordinate vassals, or feudatories, who had large portions of land allotted to them, and numerous trains of INFERIOR vassals or retainers, who occupied and cultivated that land upon the tenure of fealty or obedience, to the persons of whom they held it. Each principal vassal was a kind of sovereign, within his particular demesnes. The consequences of this situation were a continual opposition to authority of the sovereign, and frequent wars between the great barons or chief ...
— The Federalist Papers

... of Pennsylvania. Mr. Buchanan was a friend of the General, and to what point it may have been expected or hoped that his allegiance would carry him in support of his chief in this dire hour of extremity is matter only of inference. Fortunately, however, his fealty does not appear to have led him any great distance from the truth. He yielded to the prevailing desire to pass along the responsibility to some one else so far as to try to bring in a Mr. Markley, ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse

... that this reckless lawlessness was attended with insubordination or lack of discipline. On the contrary, they were rigorously governed by an iron hand and by the unwritten "code of honor." A pirate entered upon "the account" (a term meaning piracy) by taking the oath of fealty to the cause, abjuring all social ties, pledging himself never to desert his ship or defraud his comrades or steal anything belonging to his fellows. Having thus bound him by an oath firm and dreadful in its malediction upon any violation of its terms, the organization is completed ...
— Pirates and Piracy • Oscar Herrmann

... was Robert Bruce, Lord of Annandale and Earl of Carrick. He had acted with Wallace, but afterward swore fealty to Edward. Still later he united with William Lamberton, Bishop of St. Andrews, against the English King. Edward heard of their compact while Bruce was in London, and the Scot fled to Dumfries. There, 1306, in the Church of the Gray Friars, he had an ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... her feet. With one stride he stood before her, leaning to look long into her eyes which never wavered while he read in them her woman's fealty ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller

... Espouser of equal sexship in body, soul, and all! PRIEST of a ransom'd people, endued with clearer light; A newer dispensation for those of psychic sight. We greet thee as our mentor, we meet thee as our friend, And to thy ministrations devotedly we lend The aid that comes from fealty which thou hast made so strong, Thro' touch of palm, and glint of eye, and spirit of thy song. We magnify thy mission, we glorify thy aim, Unfalteringly adhered to through ill-report and blame— The fretting of the groundlings, the fumings of the pit, The jibes and jeers ...
— Walt Whitman Yesterday and Today • Henry Eduard Legler

... working, to fashion out the plates and instruments of armed Justice in defence of beleaguered Truth, than there be pens and heads there, sitting by their studious lamps, musing, searching, revolving new notions and ideas, wherewith to present, as with their homage and their fealty, the approaching Reformation: others as fast reading, trying all things, assenting to the force of reason and convincement. What could a man require more from a Nation so pliant and so prone to seek after knowledge? ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... he ranged up and down among the farms scattered about Winburg, and grinned himself into possession of manifold eggs and plump fowls and even of soft wheat bread, the final luxury of the biscuit-sated trooper who owned his fealty. ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

... Gwinn espoused the cause of the Southern Confederacy, and lost his wonderful prestige and influence in California, as well as a fortune, in his fealty to his native state, Mississippi. In 1866 he was created Duke of Sonora by Maximilian, in the furtherance of his visionary scheme of western ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman

... five boars from the forest, come to pay their last respects to the young crusader; and to leave indigestion, perhaps, as a reminder of their fealty. From the barnyard, ten little porkers, roasted whole; one ox, four sheep—only the best joints of these, the rest given away; and ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake

... expeditions, who exerted all their energies to convert the Indians to nominal Christianity. A fanatic adventurer by the name of Giles Gonzales, acquired much celebrity for his success in inducing the natives to accept the Christian faith and to acknowledge fealty to the king of Spain. He was at the head of one hundred steel-clad warriors. His mode of persuasion, though unique, was very potent. When he approached the seat of the chief of Nicaragua, he sent a courier to ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott

... who thought himself the fittest for royal rule; so he went away from the assembly in anger, taking leave of no one. When this became known, the Danaan lords would have pursued Lir, to burn his palace and inflict punishment and wounding on himself for refusing obedience and fealty to him whom the assembly had chosen to reign over them. But Bov the Red forbade them, for he would not have war among the Danaans; and he said, "I am none the less King of the People of Dana because this man will not ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston

... matter remains in the sponges of various kinds, they have always a very strong fishy smell, which may perhaps be regarded as an additional proof of the fealty which they give to the animal kingdom. Yet we must not omit that there are substances which, though they bear the name of sponges, would rather appear, from their microscopic structure, to belong to the vegetable ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various

... severely furnished office, a kind of magistrate's court, and was confronted with—Bertie Adams! A whiskered, bearded, moustached, shabbily dressed (in a quasi-military uniform) Bertie Adams: lean, and hollow-eyed, but with the love-light in his eyes. He turned on her such a look of dog-like fealty, of happy recognition that although, by instinct and for his safety, she was about to deny all knowledge of him, she could not force her eyes or tongue ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston

... by water, and easily kept supplied. The Yankees, however, had too great a hankering after this delectable region to give it up entirely. Some remained and swore allegiance to the Manhattoes; but, while they kept this open semblance of fealty, they went to work secretly and vigorously to intermarry and multiply, and by these nefarious means, artfully propagated themselves into possession of a wide tract of those open, arable parts of Westchester ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving

... seeking freedom from your allegiance to one man, in order to swear fealty to another. That your vows to me are irksome because they prevent your taking other vows to Cecil Cumberland. I pass over the moral aspect of the affair; that must rest with your own conscience," (it is astonishing how exemplary Thorne felt in administering the ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland

... Sakalava chiefs in that part of the island have at various times rendered fealty to ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various

... was but natural that a Democratic judge should decide to remove him, but to be assailed by his own party was too much for even his fealty. Hence he proclaimed himself a Democrat and was received with ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field

... to the morn, the world exulting sings; Only to Him, in fealty we are sworn, Lord of our lives, Immortal King of ...
— Hymns from the Morningland - Being Translations, Centos and Suggestions from the Service - Books of the Holy Eastern Church • Various

... the patriotism of New England through the War of the Revolution, one is surprised at the unpatriotic actions of that section of the United States in 1812. One can hardly believe that it was party fealty and political hatred of the democratic party alone which made these formerly patriotic colonies and States hot-beds of sedition and treason. It looks as if those States, having built up a flourishing trade with Great Britain, cared little about the impressment ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,

... Indian; but there is something about him that makes one thing of all of these, singly and collectively. His body is twisted and grotesque, and when one looks at his face, one feels a desire to touch him, to swear eternal fealty to him—until one looks into his pale eyes, eyes almost milky in their paleness—and gets the merest hint of the thoughts which actuate him. If he has a failing I did not find it. He does ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various

... customs of the realm. The question was captious, as neither the number nor the tendency of these customs had been defined; and the Archbishop with equal policy replied that he would observe them, "saving his order." The clause was admitted when the clergy swore fealty to the sovereign; why should it be rejected when they only promised the observance of customs? The King put the question separately to all the prelates, and, with the exception of the Bishop of Chichester, received from each the same answer. His eyes flashed with indignation: they ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... Crusaders did little except undertake several forays, and Saladin at length returned towards Palestine, winning many victories and conquering Aleppo on the way. He next ravaged Samaria, and at last received the fealty of the lord of Mosul, though he did not succeed in actually conquering ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... purse-strings, all the time meditates your overthrow and pursues it to its accomplishment? How paint the wretch who, under pretence of agreement in your opinions, worms himself into your secrets only to betray them; and who, upon the same altar with you, pledges his faith and fealty to the same principles, and then sells faith, and fealty, and principles, and you alike, for the unhallowed Judas guerdon? Of such, on his own confession was that distinguished upholder of the British crown and government, Mr. Devany. With an affrontery that did not falter, and knew not how to blush, ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various

... Arthur, faint and pale: 'Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name, Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight: 75 For surer sign had follow'd, either hand, Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. This is a shameful thing for men to lie. Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing 80 I bad thee, watch, and lightly ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson

... them such money as he could spare, and had, he thought, become their friend as well as their hereditary guardian. All had gone well at first. They had listened to him, accepted his advice and his money and renewed their fealty under the new order of things, vowing that whatever happened elsewhere in Russia, blood and agony and starvation should ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs

... Will had more reasons than one for appearing as a wizard at Nottingham Fair. He had gone here chiefly to bear a scroll to the Prince's emissary, and to declare fealty to John; but the affair of the tumblers and Robin's discovery of him had warned Master Will not to stay over long in the town, so Geoffrey had to depend upon his plan of appearing as ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick

... with her charges, Edgar, Margaret, and Christina; how it had come about that the crown, which should have been her darling's, had been seized by the fierce duke from beyond the sea; how Edgar, then a mere child, had been forced to swear oaths of fealty by which he held himself still bound; how her sweetest pearl of ladies, her jewel Margaret, had been wedded to the rude wild King of Scots, and how her gentle sweetness and holiness had tamed and softened him, so that she had been the blessing of his kingdom ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge

... prince to Glocester, where the ceremony of coronation was performed, in the presence of Gualo, the legate, and of a few noblemen, by the bishops of Winchester and Bath.[*] As the concurrence of the papal authority was requisite to support the tottering throne, Henry was obliged to swear fealty to the pope, and renew that homage to which his father had already subjected the kingdom:[**] and in order to enlarge the authority of Pembroke, and to give him a more regular and legal title to it, a general council of the barons was soon after summoned at Bristol, where that nobleman ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... talk to you of her; And you shall listen, passionately still; And as the pauses in my verse recur, Think, heart, all this does fealty to ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts

... strong personality in many of the visitors, but what gives them their most significant character is the general loyalty they evince to the constitution, and government, and supreme law of the land. The President is regarded, for the time, as the embodiment of this sentiment, and the tacit fealty paid to him, as the supreme law officer, is far more elevating to the self-balanced and independent mind than if he were a monarch ad libitum, and not ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft

... The notion took the general fancy, and met with an acceptance in which the old superstition of kings by divine right was resuscitated with the vulgar. One of the vulgar lately said to an American woman who owned that we did not yield an equal personal fealty to all our Presidents, "Oh yes, but you know that it is only your people that choose the President, but God gave us the King." Nothing could be opposed to a belief so simple, as in the churches of the eldest faith the humble worshipper could not ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells

... instead of me To be our king;" and then he placed the wreath On Jesus' brow, who meekly bowed his head. And, when he took the reed, the children knelt, And cast their simple offerings at his feet: And, almost wondering why they loved him so, Kissed him with reverence, promising to yield Grave fealty. And Jesus did return Their childish salutations; and they passed Singing another song, whose music chimed With the sea's murmur, like a low sweet chant Chanted in some wide church to Jesus Christ. ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various

... grant. For the most part, the butlers observed by me have had a manner as correctly smooth and colourless as their very shirt-fronts. Aye, and in two or three of them, modern though they were in date and aspect, I could have sworn there was 'a flame of old-world fealty all bright.' Were these but the finer comedians? There was one (I will call him Brett) who had an almost dog-like way of watching his master. Was this but a calculated touch in a merely aesthetic whole? Brett was tall and slender, ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm

... The oath of fealty, as prescribed by the law of Edward and Guthrum, was very similar to that used at a later ...
— Landholding In England • Joseph Fisher

... Curio, just arrived, declaimed with indignant fervour of the violence and fury of the consuls and Pompeius; and when he concluded, the veterans could restrain their ardour and devotion no more, five thousand martial throats roared forth an oath of fealty, and as many swords were waved on high in mad defiance to the Senate and the Magnus. Then cohort after cohort cried out that on this campaign they would accept no pay; and the military tribunes and centurions pledged themselves, this officer for ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... seen King Pedro of Aragon declaring himself his vassal and laying his crown upon the tomb of the apostles, that he might take it back at his hands. At the other end of Europe, John Lackland had been obliged to receive his crown from a legate after having sworn homage, fealty, and an annual tribute to the Holy See. Preaching union to the cities and republics of Italy, causing the cry ITALIA! ITALIA! to resound like the shout of a trumpet, he was the natural representative of the national ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... suitably acknowledging Dickinson's expression of fealty, was to inquire how the crisis had been brought about. The explanation made his eyes flash fire; he ground his teeth and clenched his fists with rage as he thought of how he would have punished the ruffian who had laid such brutal hands upon his little pet. ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood

... great lover of Irish poetry and song, and had, perhaps, as fine a private collection of them as there is in this country. His heart was indeed wound up in the dear old land; but he did not forget in this love the allegiance and fealty he owed to the land of his adoption. His life is but another of the many examples of Irishmen, who, living at home under a government of giant's strength used as a giant would use it, would be called a rebel; ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various

... done wisely well, my king,' he said. 'For by this kingly deed you shall rivet the hearts of the good men among these former rebels closer to your own than with rivets of steel. Thus well and wisely have ye won your kingdom and the fealty of these brave men.' ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert

... thought it yours is the way of men; But I won her troth long ere your day: You learnt how, in dying, she summoned me? 'Twas in fealty. —Sir, I've nothing ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy

... scout and many a skirmish had proved loyal and worthy allies against the fierce, intractable Tontos, many of whom had never yet come in to an agency or accepted the bounty of the government. Even a certain few of these Tontos had proffered fealty and been made useful as runners and trailers against the recalcitrants of their own band. But the Apache Yumas, their mountain blood tainted by the cross with the slothful bands of the arid, desert flats of the lower Colorado, had won a bad name from the start, and ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King

... a chair beside her, and spoke of their old love for each other, of his fealty through all transmutations; incidentally of her beauty, of her cruelty, of the light of her face which had illumined his darksome way to her—and of a lot of other things—and the Lady ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough

... in the estimation of the Romans and the subject nations. They looked alone to Caesar for all their good, and from him they feared their chiefest evil. He had become to them their providence or their fate. The adoration offered to him was not a mere act of homage or sign of fealty, but was most truly and in the highest sense a worship ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan

... as she saw herself in the little portrait he himself had painted, and which was now his legacy. His menaces and vows of vengeance against her and hers were all forgotten; her woman's heart was loyal to him whom she had owned its lord, and once more did him fealty. ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn

... from Samuel Adams to Elbridge Gerry, that the members of the Cincinnati would acquire large tracts of western land under this arrangement, and, importing peasants from Germany, would grant farms to them on terms of military service and fealty, thus introducing into America the feudal system. In order to forestall any such movement, it was provided by Congress that in any new states formed out of the western territory no person holding a hereditary title should ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske

... on to raise a troop of horse or foot in an emergency, provided it were in the service of the lawful sovereign. He made it his business to become acquainted with the condition of Marshland, in order to account to the queen for the fealty of those around him; and Elizabeth, no less than Mary, knew that she could rely on him to uphold her authority in the eastern Counties, His letters to Mary show that notwithstanding his frankness, and his freedom ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone

... darkened passage until he reached the head of the stairs, and there he recovered some consciousness of fact. He drooped slowly down into his study, and sat there in the dark and cold for hours, swearing fealty to contradictory deities of ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray

... anomalous would be the instances in which they really would do so. In reality it must be evident that, under such a rule of Publicists, subjects must stand in perpetual doubt whether the case had emerged or not which law contemplated as the dissolution of their fealty. No man would say that a province was licensed to desert, because the central government had lost a battle. But a whole campaign, or ten campaigns, would stand in the same predicament as a solitary battle, so long as the struggle was not formally renounced by the sovereign. How many years of absolute ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... the plans which had been matured on the journey Ganelon said, "God protect the good king, Marsilius. King Charles saith that if thou wilt lay aside thy Moslem faith and do homage to him at Aachen thou shalt hold in fealty to him one half the lands of Spain, but if thou failest in any respect, then will he come with sword and fire and lay waste the land and carry thee to Aachen to ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester

... paused, then stopped, slowly a sheepish smile overspread his countenance and, going upon one knee, he took the hand of Norman of Torn and kissed it, as some great and loyal noble knight might have kissed his king's hand in proof of his love and fealty. There was a certain rude, though chivalrous grandeur in the act; and it marked not only the beginning of a lifelong devotion and loyalty on the part of Shandy toward his young master, but was prophetic of the attitude which Norman of Torn was to inspire in all the men who served him during ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... spring, when the first thunder sounded, and whenever the storm swept the land, this stricken woman climbed the hills, and there, standing alone, facing the black rolling clouds, she sang her song of sorrow and of fealty. ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher

... Her mental distress was greatly enhanced by a feeling that in order to save her relatives she herself had been guilty of what to her sensitive nature appeared almost like a crime. "Was it right?" she asked herself again and again, and at last reached the conclusion that the fealty she owed to her relatives and to the man she loved justified her course—that she should shield them even at such cost to herself. "It was not curiosity that kept me passive," she thought, "but the hope, the chance to save Henry ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe

... the federation, and their chiefs had sworn eternal fealty to one another and to me. Among them were many powerful though savage nations. Their chiefs we had made ...
— Pellucidar • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... steadily, but on a different basis and from a different class from anything known before. Demonstrated personal ability to gain and maintain leadership; distinguished service to the nation in war or statecraft; courage, honour, fealty—these, in general, had been the ground for admission to the ranks of the aristocracy. In general, also, advancement to the ranks of the higher nobility was from the class of "gentlemen," though the Church, the universities, and chivalry gave, during ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram

... said, is the following entry, bearing date in the year 1399: "Thomas Goodeall came before the jurats in the common hall on the 10th day of October, and covenanted to give for his freedom 20d., and so he was received and sworn to bear fealty to our Lord the King and his successors, and to the commonalty and liberty of the port of Hethe, and to render faithful account of his lots and scots[A] as freeman there are wont." In another entry, in the same year, the building is mentioned again ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 5, May, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... Family fealty, the eager desire to right in some measure the wrong done by her father, anxious determination to repair her own fault—all these were animating impulses in this Joan of the Northland. But now especially was she aware that she was seeking by service to absolve herself in the estimation ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day

... Sumner, on May 10th the news of Sumter, and the uprising of the North, burst upon friend and foe in California. The loyal men rallied in indignation, overawing the Southern element. The oath of fealty was renewed by thousands. California's star was that day riveted in the flag. An outraged people deposed Judge Hardy, who so feebly prosecuted the slayer of Broderick. Every avenue was guarded. Conspiracy fled to back ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage

... face was for an instant transfigured by a grim fealty and the dull glow of some sectarian clannishness. Or was it possible that this woman's personality had in some mysterious way ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte

... serviceable defender of that soil in a moment of need, commit a great error in politics. The shrewd Canadians knew them better. They complained with bitterness, that at the first appearance of a war, they would hold their oaths of fealty as naught, or that if they did remain, it would only be with a view to embarrass the province with their presence, and secretly to serve the cause of their native country. The event proved that they knew their men. Scarcely had the American declaration of war ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson

... in her Majesty's name I accept your dutiful homage. It remains for you to sign this written document of fealty, in return for which I am bidden hand you her Majesty's gracious permission to you and your heirs to enjoy your territories without ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed

... Echochee, they stopped and in frank amazement gazed at her. Flushed by the excitements that had made this day memorable, she was indeed the most adorable sovereign before whom knights had e'er sworn fealty. But the old Indian woman, with an undisguised croon of delight, went straight to her side, folded her in aged, brown arms of iron, and faced the waiting men with a look of defiance. She did not comprehend all that was passing, but distinctly wanted it ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris

... thinking the song went on, and Hilary felt that did he but say yes, and swear fealty to one who believed himself to be the rightful king of England, he would be at liberty to join Adela at once. There would be an end to his imprisonment, ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn

... over accomplices, were unavailing; for those with whom they tampered had the fealty to reject their overtures, and the honesty to make a discovery of their insidious machinations. Upon this the traitors were seized, convicted, and, on the beginning of October, 1738, sentenced to be whipt and drummed out ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris

... augury, do you blame me for feeling that this communication is the last I shall ever write for the Press, especially when a sense alike of personal self-respect, of duty to this money-oppressed and fear-ridden community, and of American fealty to the spirit of true Liberty all command me, and each more loudly than love of life itself, to declare the name of that prominent man to be JOHN B. WINTERS, President of the Yellow Jacket Company, a political aspirant and a military General? ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... executors of his will, and who were responsible to him for all their acts. At Kief the system of independent apanages prevailed. The lord placed at the head of a principality was an unlimited despot, accountable to no one but God for his administration. His fealty to the king consisted merely in an understanding that he was to follow the banner of the sovereign in case of war. But in fact, these feudal lords were more frequently found claiming entire independence, and struggling against ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott

... Delilah-world will not always shear of their strength and eyesight, and set to grind in darkness at its poor gin-wheel! Such souls are, in these days, getting somewhat out of humour with the world. Your very Byron, in these days, is at least driven mad; flatly refuses fealty to the world. The world with its injustices, its golden brutalities, and dull yellow guineas, is a disgust to such souls: the ray of Heaven that is in them does at least predoom them to be very miserable here. Yes:—and yet all misery is faculty misdirected, strength that has not yet found its way. ...
— Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. • Thomas Carlyle

... Obedience.— N. obedience; observance &c. 772; compliance; submission &c. 725; subjection &c. 749; nonresistance; passiveness, resignation. allegiance, loyalty, fealty, homage, deference, devotion; constancy, fidelity. submissness[obs3], submissiveness; ductility &c. (softness) 324; obsequiousness &c. (servility) 886. V. be -obedient &c. adj.; obey, bear obedience to; submit &c. 725; comply, answer the helm, come at one's call; do one's bidding, do what ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... had felt so strongly himself, and what Grayson had suggested, and thought how he could free himself from fealty to her by cutting out the whole love-business from his play. But that would be very hard. The thing had now knitted itself in one texture in his mind, and though he could sever the ties that bound the ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells

... a bold man set to work to make peace betwixt him & the King, & in the end were they reconciled, to wit, both King Harald and Hakon; and Hakon was given Ragnhild, the King's daughter, in marriage, & King Harald gave him Orm's earldom and such rule as had been Orm's aforetime. Hakon swore fealty to the King, and likewise to afford him such service as he was ...
— The Sagas of Olaf Tryggvason and of Harald The Tyrant (Harald Haardraade) • Snorri Sturluson

... quieter; he laughed less No one spoke of the difference; it was too vague; but every one felt it, and it had an effect. His flight had made many uneasy, but his return, for that reason, brought a stancher fealty from these; and this was evident now. All eyes were upon him, and all tongues, even old Sam's, waited now for ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.

... more, for the French devours letters and syllables; and there is the later word which we borrowed immediately from the Latin. I will mention a few examples; 'secure' and 'sure', both from 'securus', but one directly, the other through the French; 'fidelity' and 'fealty', both from 'fidelitas', but one directly, the other at second-hand; 'species' and 'spice', both from 'species', spices being properly only kinds of aromatic drugs; 'blaspheme' and 'blame', both from 'blasphemare'{22}, but 'blame' immediately from 'blamer'. Add ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench

... 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 to come back to Manila, ...
— Doctrina Christiana • Anonymous

... darted through the signet, and cast a light, like a drop of blood, upon the maiden's white palm; and then the voice of the priest, raised softly in blessing, fell upon his ear with a tender hope; and at the end he knelt down very gently, and kissed the Lady Mary's hand in token of fealty; and the thought of the Earl's jest about bidding him to kiss her on the lips came like a shameful thought ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson

... 1808, an act of fealty was sworn to Ferdinand VII. This, nevertheless, met with disapproval on the part of many Argentines, who desired the establishment of a junta similar to that of Seville. The party in favour of this increased rapidly in strength, and shortly afterwards ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel



Words linked to "Fealty" :   allegiance



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