strength

From Middle English strengthe, from Old English strengþu (“strength”), from Proto-West Germanic *strangiþu (“strongness; strength”), equivalent to strong +‎ -th. Cognate with Dutch strengte (“strength”), German Low German Strengde, Strengte (“harshness; rigidity; strictness; severity”).

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /stɹɛŋkθ/, [st̠͡ɹ̠ɛŋkθ], [st̠͡ɹ̠ɛn̪θ], [st̠͡ɹ̠æŋkθ], [ˈʃt͡ʃɹeɪŋkθ]
  • (pin–pen merger) IPA^(key): [st̠͡ɹ̠ɪŋkθ]

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• Rhymes: -ɛŋθ, -ɛnθ

strength (countable and uncountable, plural strengths)

1. The quality or degree of being strong.

   It requires great strength to lift heavy objects.

   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act V, scene v]:

     Our castle’s strength will laugh a siege to scorn.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter V, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, OCLC 4293071:

     He was thinking; but the glory of the song, the swell from the great organ, the clustered lights, […] , the height and vastness of this noble fane, its antiquity and its strength—all these things seemed to have their part as causes of the thrilling emotion that accompanied his thoughts.

   Antonym: weakness

2. The intensity of a force or power; potency.

   He had the strength of ten men.

   • 1699, William Temple, Heads designed for an essay on conversations

     Study gives strength to the mind; conversation, grace: the first apt to give stiffness, the other suppleness: one gives substance and form to the statue, the other polishes it.

3. The strongest part of something; that on which confidence or reliance is based.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, Psalms 46:1:

     God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

   • 1649, Jeremy Taylor, The Great Examplar of Sanctity and Holy Life according to the Christian Institution, London: Francis Ash, Part 1, Section 4, Discourse 2, p. 66,

     […] certainly there is not in the world a greater strength against temptations, then is deposited in an obedient understanding […] .

4. A positive attribute.

   We all have our own strengths and weaknesses.

   Antonym: weakness

5. (obsolete) An armed force, a body of troops.
   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act IV, scene iii]:

     Thou princely leader of our English strength,
     Never so needful on the earth of France,

   • c. 1596, William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act II, scene i]:

     That done, dissever your united strengths,
     And part your mingled colours once again;

6. (obsolete) A strong place; a stronghold.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], OCLC 228722708; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, OCLC 230729554, lines 140-143:

     All like himself rebellious, by whose aid
     This inaccessible high strength, the seat
     Of Deitie supream, us dispossest,
     He trusted to have seis’d […]

strength (third-person singular simple present strengths, present participle strengthing, simple past and past participle strengthed)

1. (obsolete) To strengthen (all senses). [12th–17th c.]
   • 1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], OCLC 762018299, Colossians j:[11], folio cclviiii, verso:

     ſtrengthed with all myght / thꝛowe hys gloꝛious power / vnto all pacience / and longe ſufferynge with ioyfulnes

   • 1529, John Frith, A piſtle to the Chriſten reader […] ‎:

     Then ſhalt thow perceave what it meaneth that the power of this wretched monſtre / muſt be ſtrengthed / by anothers power and not by his awne.

   • 1550, Edward Halle, “King Henry the viij.”, in The Vnion of the Two Noble and Illuſtre Famelies of Lancaſtre and Yoꝛke‎, page 1271:

     In witnes wherof we haue cauſed this pꝛeſent wꝛiting to be ſtrengthed with the ſeal of our facultie […]

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:strengthen