Oath definitions and example sentences on Wordnik

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Definitions (48)

American Heritage Dictionary (5)

noun A solemn, formal declaration or promise to fulfill a pledge, often calling on God, a god, or a sacred object as witness.
noun The words or formula of such a declaration or promise.
noun Something declared or promised.

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Century Dictionary (39)

A solemn appeal to the Supreme Being in attestation of the truth of some statement or the binding character of some covenant, undertaking, or promise; an outward pledge that one's testimony or promise is given under an immediate sense of responsibility to God. For thei seyn, He that swerethe will disceyve his Neyghbore: and therefor alle that thei don, thei don it withouten Othe. Mandeville, Travels, p. 292. Such an act … makes marriage-vows As false as dicers' oaths. Shak., Hamlet, iii. 4. 45. Neither is there or can be any tie ou human society when that of an oath is no more regarded; which being an appeal to God, he is immediate judge of it. Dryden, Vind. of Duke of Guise. All the officers appointed by congress were to take an oath of fidelity as well as of office. Bancroft, Hist. Const., II. 113.
The form of words in which such attestation is made. Oaths are of two kinds: assertory oaths, or those by which something is asserted as true, and promissory oaths (see promissory oath, oath of allegiance, and oath of office, below). Witnesses are allowed to take an oath in any form which they consider binding on their conscience. Provision is made in the cases of those who have conscientious objections to the taking of an oath, or those who are objected to as incompetent to take an oath, whereby they are allowed to substitute an affirmation or solemn promise and declaration. Oaths to perform illegal acts do not bind, nor do they excuse the performance of the act.
A light or blasphemous use of the name of the Divine Being, or of anything associated with the more sacred matters of religion, by way of appeal, imprecation, or ejaculation. And specyally in youth gentilmen ben tawght To swere gret othis, they sey for jentery; Every boy wenyth it be annext to curtesy. MS. Laud 416, f. 39. (Halliwell, under jentery.) Swear me, Kate, like a lady as thou art, A good mouth-filling oath. Shak., 1 Hen. IV., iii. l. 259. The Axes so oft blistered their tender fingers that many times every third blow had a loud othe to drowne the echo. Quoted in Capt. John Smith's Works, I. 197. The Accusing Spirit, which flew up to Heaven's chancery with the oath, blushed as he gave it in; and the Recording Angel, as he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word, and blotted it out forever. Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vi. 8.

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This was an old Roman custom, and apparently what they said for an oath translates as "Bet your testicles that I am telling the truth, your honor." — Political Animal
No oath is there prescribed, and not till 1536 was it made high treason to refuse to take the oath of supremacy; even then the oath was to be administered only to civil and ecclesiastical officers. — Henry VIII.
Mr. Hume moved that the oath should be administered to Baron Rothschild on the Old Testament. — The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. From George III. to Victoria
"You must first take an oath, so that in the event of your changing your mind in the future, and telling anything to anyone, the oath might be accomplished You're quite right!" — Hung Lou Meng, Book II Or, the Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel in Two Books
Once the oath was administered, these new deputies were confronted by the choice between perjury and service. — The Gray Dawn

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vow · curse · exclamation · shout · declaration · obligation · ceremony · prayer · pledge · gesture · laughter · promise

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

American Heritage Dictionary (1)

Middle English oth, from Old English āth.

Century Dictionary (2)

Early modern English also othe; from Middle English oth, ooth, earlier ath, from Anglo-Saxon āth = Old Saxon ēth, ēd = OFries. eth, ed = D. eed = Old High German eid, Middle High German eit, German eid = Icelandic eidhr = Swedish Danish ed = Goth, aiths, an oath; prob. = Old Irish oeth, an oath; no other forms found; root unknown.
Middle English othen, athen; from oath, n.

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