Skip to content
OneKitly

lordship

nouncommon in dialogue

  • United Kingdom//ˈlɔːd.ʃɪp//
  • United States//ˈlɔɹd.ʃɪp//

The state or condition of being a lord.

noun

  1. 1

    The state or condition of being a lord.

    For example, we know that Alfred did connect land tenure with lordship and that he was particularly interested in questions of military service[…]

    Lordship entails both privilege and responsibility. Lords have power over their subjects, but that power is granted them so that they can protect and provide for others.

  2. 2

    Title applied to a lord, bishop, judge, or another man with a title.

    May I ask that the order be granted, if your lordship so pleases?

    'He's had his bath,' she said. 'He's just had his bath, bless his little lordship's heart.'

    Charles had not been employed above six months at Darracott Place, but he was not such a whopstraw as to make the least noise in the performance of his duties when his lordship was out of humour.

  3. 3

    A man (sometimes a boy) who is behaving in a seigneurial manner or acting like a lord, behaving in a bossy manner or lording it up

  4. 4

    Seigniory; domain; the territory over which a lord holds jurisdiction; a manor.

    What lands and lordships for their owner know / My quondam barber, but his worship now.

    […]for whose ransom he compelled Lord Percy to build the castle of Punnoon, in the lordship of Eaglesham.

  5. 5

    Dominion; power; authority.

    But Jesus called them to him, and saith unto them, Ye know that they which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and their great ones exercise authority upon them.

Etymology

From Middle English lordschipe, from Old English hlāfordsċiepe, equivalent to lord + -ship. Cognate with Scots lairdschip. Doublet of lairdship.

Forms

plural
lordships
The neighbouring pagesAlphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.

Lexical content from Wiktionary, under CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source entry · Data version 2026-08-23

Rank among the words of the OpenSubtitles 2018 corpus — film and television subtitles, so spoken rather than written usage (CC BY-SA 3.0).