noun

1. official permission or approval

e.g. authority for the program was renewed several times

Synonym: authorizationauthorisationsanction

2. the power or right to give orders or make decisions

e.g. he has the authority to issue warrants
deputies are given authorization to make arrests
a place of potency in the state

Synonym: authorizationauthorisationpotencydominancesay-so

3. freedom from doubt
belief in yourself and your abilities

e.g. his assurance in his superiority did not make him popular
after that failure he lost his confidence
she spoke with authority

Synonym: assuranceself-assuranceconfidenceself-confidencesureness

4. an authoritative written work

e.g. this book is the final authority on the life of Milton

5. an administrative unit of government

e.g. the Central Intelligence Agency
the Census Bureau
Office of Management and Budget
Tennessee Valley Authority

Synonym: agencyfederal agencygovernment agencybureauoffice

6. an expert whose views are taken as definitive

e.g. he is an authority on corporate law

7. (usually plural) persons who exercise (administrative) control over others

e.g. the authorities have issued a curfew

noun

1. the act of combining things to form a new whole

Synonym: combiningcompounding

2. the act of arranging elements into specified groups without regard to order

3. a collection of things that have been combined
an assemblage of separate parts or qualities

4. an alliance of people or corporations or countries for a special purpose (formerly to achieve some antisocial end but now for general political or economic purposes)

5. a group of people (often temporary) having a common purpose

e.g. they were a winning combination

6. a sequence of numbers or letters that opens a combination lock

e.g. he forgot the combination to the safe

7. a coordinated sequence of chess moves

verb

1. fail to meet the hopes or expectations of

e.g. Her boyfriend let her down when he did not propose marriage

Synonym: let down

noun

1. the quality of being near to the true value

e.g. he was beginning to doubt the accuracy of his compass
the lawyer questioned the truth of my account

Synonym: accuracy

2. a fact that has been verified

e.g. at last he knew the truth
the truth is that he didn't want to do it

3. a true statement

e.g. he told the truth
he thought of answering with the truth but he knew they wouldn't believe it

Synonym: true statement

4. conformity to reality or actuality

e.g. they debated the truth of the proposition
the situation brought home to us the blunt truth of the military threat
he was famous for the truth of his portraits
he turned to religion in his search for eternal verities

Synonym: the trueveritytrueness

adj

1. having a meaning or purpose

e.g. a meaningful explanation
a meaningful discussion
a meaningful pause

noun

1. a postulated sequence of possible events

e.g. planners developed several scenarios in case of an attack

2. an outline or synopsis of a play (or, by extension, of a literary work)

3. a setting for a work of art or literature

e.g. the scenario is France during the Reign of Terror

noun

1. hereditary succession to a title or an office or property

Synonym: heritage

2. any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors

e.g. my only inheritance was my mother's blessing
the world's heritage of knowledge

Synonym: heritage

3. (genetics) attributes acquired via biological heredity from the parents

Synonym: hereditary pattern

4. that which is inherited
a title or property or estate that passes by law to the heir on the death of the owner

Synonym: heritage