superior

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. adj. Higher than another in rank, station, or authority: a superior officer.
2. adj. Of a higher nature or kind.
3. adj. Of great value or excellence; extraordinary.
4. adj. Greater in number or amount than another: an army defeated by superior numbers of enemy troops.
5. adj. Affecting an attitude of disdain or conceit; haughty and supercilious.
6. adj. Above being affected or influenced; indifferent or immune: "Trust magnates were superior to law” ( Gustavus Myers).
7. adj. Located higher than another; upper.
8. adj. Botany Inserted or situated above the perianth. Used of an ovary.
9. adj. Printing Set above the main line of type.
10. adj. Logic Of wider or more comprehensive application; generic. Used of a term or proposition.
11. n. One that surpasses another in rank or quality.
12. n. Ecclesiastical The head of a religious community, such as a monastery, abbey, or convent.
13. n. Printing A superior character, as the number 2 in x².

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. More elevated in place; higher; upper: as, the superior limb of the sun: opposed to inferior.
2. In anatomy and zoology, upper in relative position or direction; uppermost with regard to something else: correlated with anterior, inferior, and posterior. The epithet was originally used in anatomical language to note the parts relatively so situated in man, and has caused much confusion in its extension to other animals, since that which is superior in man becomes anterior in must animals, and so on with the three correlated words. The tendency is now to replace these epithets with others not affected by the posture of the animal, as cephalic, caudal, dorsal, and ventral, with the corresponding adverbs ending in -ad.
3. In botany: Placed higher, as noting the relative position of the calyx and ovary: thus, the ovary is superior when the calyx is quite free from it, as normally; the calyx is superior when from being adnate to the ovary it appears to spring from its top.
4. Next the axis; belonging to the part of an axillary flower which is toward the main stem. Also called posterior.
5. Pointing toward the apex of the fruit; ascending: said of the radicle.
6. Higher in rank or office; more exalted in dignity: as, a superior officer; a superior degree of nobility.
7. Higher or greater in respect to some quality or property; possessed or manifested in a higher (or, absolutely, very high) degree: applied to persons and things, and to their qualities and properties; surpassing others in the greatness, goodness, extent, or value of any quality; in mathematics, greater.
8. Being beyond the power or influence of something; too great or firm to be subdued or affected by something; above: used only predicatively or appositively: with to: as, a man superior to revenge. Sometimes used sarcastically, as of an assumed quality, without to: as, he smiled with a superior air.
9. In logic, less in comprehension; loss determinate; having less depth, and consequently commonly wider.
10. Synonyms Paramount, surpassing, predominant.
11. n. One who is superior to or above another; one who is higher or greater than another, as in social station, rank, office, dignity, power, or ability.
12. n. Specifically The chief of a monastery, convent, or abbey.
13. n. In Scots law, one who or whoso predecessor has made an original grant of heritable property on condition that the grantee, termed the vassal, shall annually pay to him a certain sum (commonly called feu-duty) or perform certain services.
14. n. In printing, a small figure or letter standing above or near the top of the line, used as a mark of reference or for other purposes: thus, x, a; so back, back, and other homonyms as distinguished in this dictionary.

Wiktionary

1. adj. Higher in quality.
2. adj. Higher in rank.
3. adj. Located above.
4. adj. Being greater or better than average; extraordinary.
5. n. A person of higher rank or quality.
6. n. The senior person in a monastic community.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. adj. More elevated in place or position; higher; upper.
2. adj. Higher in rank or office; more exalted in dignity.
3. adj. Higher or greater in excellence; surpassing others in the greatness, or value of any quality; greater in quality or degree.
4. adj. Beyond the power or influence of; too great or firm to be subdued or affected by; -- with to.
5. adj. More comprehensive; as a term in classification.
6. adj. Above the ovary; -- said of parts of the flower which, although normally below the ovary, adhere to it, and so appear to originate from its upper part; also of an ovary when the other floral organs are plainly below it in position, and free from it.
7. adj. Belonging to the part of an axillary flower which is toward the main stem; posterior.
8. adj. Pointing toward the apex of the fruit; ascending; -- said of the radicle.
9. n. One who is above, or surpasses, another in rank, station, office, age, ability, or merit; one who surpasses in what is desirable.
10. n. (Eccl.) The head of a monastery, convent, abbey, or the like.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a town in northwest Wisconsin on Lake Superior across from Duluth
2. adj. of or characteristic of high rank or importance
3. adj. of high or superior quality or performance
4. adj. having a higher rank
5. adj. written or printed above and to one side of another character
6. adj. (sometimes followed by `to') not subject to or influenced by
7. n. the head of a religious community
8. n. a character or symbol set or printed or written above and immediately to one side of another character
9. n. a combatant who is able to defeat rivals
10. adj. having an orbit farther from the sun than the Earth's orbit
11. n. the largest freshwater lake in the world; the deepest of the Great Lakes
12. n. one of greater rank or station or quality
13. adj. (often followed by `to') above being affected or influenced by