liege
Meanings
Plural: lieges
Noun
- a person holding a fief; a person who owes allegiance and service to a feudal lord
- a feudal lord entitled to allegiance and service
- city in eastern Belgium; largest French-speaking city in Belgium
- A free and independent person; specifically, a lord paramount; a sovereign.
- A king or lord.
- The subject of a sovereign or lord; a liegeman.
Adjective Satellite
- owing or owed feudal allegiance and service
- "one's liege lord"
- "a liege subject"
Adj
- Sovereign; independent; having authority or right to allegiance.
- Serving an independent sovereign or master; bound by a feudal tenure; obliged to be faithful and loyal to a superior, such as a vassal to his lord; faithful.
- Full; perfect; complete; pure.
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English liege, lege, lige, from Anglo-Norman lige, from Old French liege (“liege, free”), from Middle High German ledic, ledec (“free, empty, vacant”) (Modern German ledig (“unmarried”)) from Proto-Germanic *liþugaz (“flexible, free, unoccupied”).
Akin to Old Frisian leþeg, leþoch (“free”), Old English liþiġ (“flexible”), Old Norse liðugr (“free, unhindered”), Old Saxon lethig (“idle”), Low German leddig (“empty”), Middle Dutch ledich (“idle, unemployed”) (Dutch ledig (“empty”) and leeg (“empty”)), Middle English lethi (“unoccupied, at leisure”).
An alternate etymology traces the Old French word to Late Latin laeticus (“of or relating to a semifree colonist in Gaul”), from Latin laetus (“a semi-free colonist”), from Gothic *𐌻𐌴𐍄𐍃 (*lēts) (attested in derivatives such as 𐍆𐍂𐌰𐌻𐌴𐍄𐍃 (fralēts)), from Proto-Germanic *lētaz (“freeman; bondsman, serf”), from *lētaną (“to let; free; release”).
Scrabble Score: 6
liege is a valid Scrabble (US) TWL wordliege is a valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
liege is a valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary