fate
pronunciation
How to pronounce fate in British English:
UK [feɪt]
How to pronounce fate in American English:
US [feɪt]
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- Noun:
- an event (or a course of events) that will inevitably happen in the future
- your overall circumstances or condition in life (including everything that happens to you)
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- Verb:
- decree or designate beforehand
Word Origin
- fate
- fate: [14] Etymologically, fate is ‘that which is spoken’ – that is, by the gods. Like so many other English words, from fable to profess, it goes back ultimately to the Indo-European base *bha- ‘speak’. Its immediate source was Italian fato, a descendant of Latin fātum, which was formed from the past participle of the verb fārī ‘speak’.That which the gods say determines the destiny of human beings, and so Latin fātum came to signify ‘what is preordained, destiny’. It was used in the plural fāta to personify the Fates, the three goddesses who preside over human destiny – their direct etymological descendants in English have been diminished to fairies. The derivative fatal [14] comes from Latin fatālis, perhaps via Old French fatal.=> confess, fable, fairy, profess
- fate (n.)
- late 14c., "one's lot or destiny; predetermined course of life;" also "one's guiding spirit," from Old French fateand directly from Latin fata (source also of Spanish hado, Portuguese fado, Italian fato), neuter plural of fatum "prophetic declaration of what must be, oracle, prediction," thus the Latin word's usual sense, "that which is ordained, destiny, fate," literally "thing spoken (by the gods)," from neuter past participle of fari "to speak," from PIE *bha- (2) "speak" (see fame (n.)). From early 15c. as "power that rules destinies, agency which predetermines events; supernatural predetermination;" also "destiny personified." Meaning "that which must be" is from 1660s; sense of "final event" is from 1768. The Latin sense evolution is from "sentence of the Gods" (Greek theosphaton) to "lot, portion" (Greek moira, personified as a goddess in Homer). The sense "one of the three goddesses (Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos) who determined the course of a human life" is in English by 1580s. Often in a bad sense in Latin: "bad luck, ill fortune; mishap, ruin; a pest or plague." The native word in English was wyrd (see weird).
- fate (v.)
- "to preordain as if by fate; to be destined by fate," c. 1600, from fate (n.). Earlier it meant "to destroy" (c. 1400). Related: Fated; fating.
Example
- 1. Apple is unlikely to suffer a similar fate .
- 2. Glorifying a president may be tempting fate again .
- 3. This melancholy fate worries him not one jot .
- 4. Tempting fate is never wise ; tempting a flu pandemic is downright foolish .
- 5. And five days in a moscow jail is not the worst fate that can be imagined .