tradition

Etymology

From Old French tradicion, from Latin trāditiō, from the verb trādere.

Pronunciation

• enPR: trə-dishʹ(ə)n, IPA^(key): /tɹəˈdɪʃən/, /tɹəˈdɪʃn̩/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪʃən

Noun

tradition (countable and uncountable, plural traditions)

1. A part of culture that is passed from person to person or generation to generation, possibly differing in detail from family to family, such as the way to celebrate holidays.
   • 1920, T. S. Eliot, “Tradition and the Individual Talent”, in The Sacred Wood:

     Yet if the only form of tradition, of handing down, consisted in following the ways of the immediate generation before us in a blind or timid adherence to its successes, "tradition" should positively be discouraged.

   • 1928, Lawrence R. Bourne, chapter 2, in Well Tackled!‎:

     Evidently he did not mean to be a mere figurehead, but to carry on the old tradition of Wilsthorpe's; and that was considered to be a good thing in itself and an augury for future prosperity.

   • 1850, Charles Dickens, A Christmas Tree:

     After breakfast, Charles Macdoodle told Lady Mary that it was a tradition in the family that those rumbling carriages on the terrace betokened death.

2. A commonly held system. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
3. The act of delivering into the hands of another; delivery.
   • Blackstone

     A deed takes effect only from the tradition or delivery.

Verb

tradition (third-person singular simple present traditions, present participle traditioning, simple past and past participle traditioned)

1. (obsolete) To transmit by way of tradition; to hand down.
   • Fuller

     The following story is […] traditioned with very much credit amongst our English Catholics.

Noun

tradition c (singular definite traditionen, plural indefinite traditioner)

1. tradition

Noun

tradition

1. Genitive singular form of traditio.

Etymology

Old French; Borrowed from Latin trāditiō, from the verb trādere. Compare trahison.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /tʁa.di.sjɔ̃/

• Audio (France, Paris)

  (file)

• Homophone: traditions
• Hyphenation: tra‧di‧tion

Noun

tradition f (plural traditions)

1. tradition

Further reading

• “tradition” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Alternative forms

• tradicion

Etymology

Old French tradicion (“delivery”), a borrowing from Latin.

Noun

tradition f (plural traditions)

1. delivery
2. treason
3. fable; oral narrative
4. custom
5. tradition

References

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (tradicion)
• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (tradition, supplement)

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

tradition c

1. tradition