war
Meanings
- Organized, large-scale, armed conflict between countries or between national, ethnic, or other sizeable groups, usually but not always involving active engagement of military forces.
- A particular conflict of this kind.
- Protracted armed conflict against irregular forces, particularly groups considered terrorists.
- Any protracted conflict, particularly
- A sustained campaign against a social problem, idea, set of values, etc.
- A protracted instance of fierce competition in trade.
- A prolonged conflict between two groups of organized criminals, usually over organizational or territorial control.
- An argument between two or more people with opposing opinions on a topic or issue.
- An assembly of weapons; instruments of war.
- Armed forces.
- Any of a family of card games where all cards are dealt at the beginning of play and players attempt to capture them all, typically involving no skill and only serving to kill time.
- To engage in conflict (may be followed by "with" to specify the foe).
- To carry on, as a contest; to wage.
- Preceded by the: designating a particularly notable war.
- World War I.
- World War II.
- The personification of war, often depicted in armour and riding a red horse; the red rider.
- A city in West Virginia, United States.
- Initialism of White Aryan Resistance.
- Initialism of Web Application aRchive (a Java archive file).
- Initialism of Winchester Automatic Rifle.
- Initialism of Women Against Registry.
- Initialism of write after read, a kind of data hazard.
- Acronym of wins above replacement.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English werre, from Late Old English werre /wyrre (“armed conflict”), from Anglo-Norman and Old Northern French guerre /werre (compare modern French guerre), from Medieval Latin werra, from Frankish *werʀu (“confusion; quarrel”), from Proto-Indo-European *wers- (“to mix up, confuse, beat, thresh”). Gradually displaced native Old English beadu, hild, ġewinn, orleġe, wīġ, and many others as the general term for "war" during the Middle English period. Related to Old High German werra (“confusion, strife, quarrel”) and German verwirren (“to confuse”), but not to Wehr (“defense”). Also related to Old Saxon werran (“to confuse, perplex”), Dutch war (“confusion, disarray”), West Frisian war (“struggle, resistance, defense, effort, exertion, activity”), Old English wyrsa, wiersa (“worse”), Old Norse verri (“worse, orig. confounded, mixed up”), Italian guerra (“war”). There may be a connection with worse and wurst.