Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Properly or sufficiently qualified; capable: a competent typist.
- adj. Adequate for the purpose: a competent performance.
- adj. Law Legally qualified or fit to perform an act.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Answering all requirements; suitable; fit; sufficient or adequate for the purpose: as, competent supplies of food and clothing; an army competent to the defense of the kingdom.
- Having ability or capacity; properly qualified: as, a competent bookkeeper.
- In law, having legal capacity or qualification: as, a competent judge or court; a competent witness. In a judge or court it implies right or authority to hear and determine; in a witness it implies a legal capacity to testify. See
competence , 3. - Rightfully or lawfully belonging; pertaining by right; permissible: followed by to.
- Fitted, etc. See qualified.
- n. One of the competentes (which see).
- In physical geography, of a stream, capable of transporting fragments of a given size.
- In geology, having sufficient firmness and strength to transmit pressure to other strata or to lift an overlying burden, as a rock or stratum.
Wiktionary
- adj. Having sufficient skill, knowledge, ability, or qualifications.
- adj. law Having jurisdiction or authority over a particular issue or question.
- adj. Adequate for the purpose
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Answering to all requirements; adequate; sufficient; suitable; capable; legally qualified; fit.
- adj. Rare, except in legal usage. Rightfully or properly belonging; incident; -- followed by
to .
WordNet 3.0
- adj. properly or sufficiently qualified or capable or efficient
- adj. adequate for the purpose
- adj. legally qualified or sufficient
Etymologies
- Middle English, adequate, from Old French, from Latin competēns, competent-, present participle of competere, to be suitable; see compete. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“(which nobody denies actually to subsist,) and after stating, that, if juries are not reputed competent to try the whole matter, the benefit of trial by jury will be of none or imperfect effect, it enacts, not that the jury _shall_ have the _power_, but that they shall be _held and reputed in law and right competent_ to try the whole matter laid in the information.”
The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 07 (of 12)
“Devaud said that a Pakistani government anti-corruption agency had posted on its Web site what he described as competent English-language translations of the original orders he had issued against Bhutto, Zardari and Schlegelmilch in 2003.”
“We have constant, what we call competent air patrol or CAP over New York and over Washington.”
“This awful expression refers to a firm's or a person's fundamental strength-even though that's not what the word "competent" means.”
“As I have written above, what we know as competent physical science pertains to man's relationship to the subject-matters of the domain of the abiotic and the Biosphere; Classical artistic expressions pertain to the essential relationship of the creative faculties through which human relations as such are expressed in an ironical mode comparable to that of physical scientific practice.”
“The fact that brown could lie about his own intentions and his goals is totally down to in competent democratic message handling.”
“The ability of your children to have a positive emotional reaction begins with a firm grounding in their feeling loved, secure, and competent, in other words, their self-esteem.”
“They'll increase our ability to train competent Afghan security forces, and to partner with them so that more Afghans can get into the fight.”
“It seems that over the past 30 years being mentally competent is no longer a requirement to run in the political arena, and there seems to be a precedent for having someone who is not “all there” in the White House.”
Think Progress » McCain To Propose Amendment Prohibiting Changes To Medicare Using Reconciliation
“The American people would believe they believed in competent governance and liberal issues like Health Care Reform and Climate Change might get an easier hearing.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘competent’.
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EU Buzz - ALL words and expressions
A combined list of
1. EU Buzz - single words
2. EU Buzz - collocations
3. EU Buzz - the 100 most active
collocation constituentsabsorption capacity, absorption rate, acceding country, accession candidate, accession countries, accession country, accession criteria, accession cycle, accession negotia..., accession partner..., accession priorities, accession treaty and 2650 more...
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EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...health, follow, condition, meeting, minister, beginning, chapter, information, language, remain, covered, respect and 2614 more...
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EU Buzz - single words (1+2+3)
1. Strictly EU terms with special European meaning used only in the EU
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2. Keywords central to the understanding of the EU (people working for the EU are usually able to give thematic...acceleration, action, additionality, administrator, agenda, agricultural, agri-environmental, agriflation, agri-food, applicant, approach, assent and 1325 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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ENVI - non-commercial movement of pet...
You can manipulate this list here: http://www.visualthesaurus.com/wordlists/184552
rabies, categorisation, transponder, point of entry, derogation, veterinarian, safety feature, identification, resubmit, vaccinate, pet, immunise and 71 more...
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Vocab4
acquire, antagonize, competent, comprise, correspond, dilapidated, illustrious, incident, inherit, latitude, loath, maintain and 3 more...
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Shadowkeir's list
This list, the one shown below this very message, is a collection of words that you cannot begin to fathom how much I adore. The list will also feature atithesis and contrasting words such as the t...
wishful, anticlimactic, forte, monchromatic, septic, wonderous, isoclinal, deformed, disintergrate, favourite, laughable, awe-inspiring and 250 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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Beknownst1981's list
I love words, especially the ones I make up with my friends.
translucent meat ..., beknownst (knew), plethora, curmudgeon, wanderlust, actually, differentiate, bearded, hobbit feet, female, sexy time, librarian and 220 more...
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Intricate Word's
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my dictionary
able, abnormally, abroad, absent, abstract, acceptable, acceptance, access, accessible, accession, according to, account and 4551 more...
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KaeZoo's Words
flingers, unhinged, driven, flanked, arboreal, venerable, endearing, iconoclastic, fletcher, competent, fireproof, cavernous and 215 more...
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lesson 4
aquire, antagonize, competent, comprise, correspond, dilapidated, illustrious, incident, erit, latitude, loath, maintain and 3 more...
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Lesson 4
acquire, antagonize, competent, comprise, correspond, dilapitated, illustrious, incident, inherit, latitude, loath, maintain and 3 more...
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vcabulary nummbahh 4
acquire, antagonize, competent, supervise, reprimend, renovate, maintain, loath, latitude, inherit, incedent, illustrious and 3 more...
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Vocab Lesson 4
acquire, antagonize, competent, comprize, correspond, dilapidated, illustrious, incident, inherit, latitude, loath, maintain and 3 more...
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