alliance

• alliaunce (obsolete)

From Middle English alliaunce, from Old French aliance (French alliance). Equivalent to ally +‎ -ance. Compare with Doric Greek ἁλία (halía, “assembly”).

• (US) IPA^(key): /əˈlaɪ.əns/
• Rhymes: -aɪəns

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

alliance (countable and uncountable, plural alliances)

1. (uncountable) The state of being allied.
2. (countable) The act of allying or uniting.
3. (countable) A union or connection of interests between families, states, parties, etc., especially between families by marriage and states by compact, treaty, or league.

   matrimonial alliances

   an alliance between church and state, or between two countries

   1. (dated or India) Marriage.
4. (countable) Any union resembling that of families or states; union by relationship in qualities; affinity.
   • 1624, William Udall, The Historie of the Life and Death of Mary Stuart Queene of Scotland:

     And as for kindred , there is no Alliance neerer vnto any one, than their Countrey , that is to be vnto vs another God, and our prime and deareſt Parent.

   • 1871, Charles John Smith, Synonyms Discriminated:

     the alliance of the principles of the world with those of the gospel

   • 1860, Henry Longueville Mansel, Prolegomena Logica: An Inquiry Into the Psychological Character of Logical Processes:

     the alliance […] between logic and metaphysics

5. (with the definite article) The persons or parties allied.
6. (taxonomy, dated) Synonym of cohort (“group of orders of organisms”).

• (union by relationship in qualities): connection, affinity, union, allyship
• (act of allying): union
• (persons or parties allied): coalition, league, confederation, team (informal)

• ally

alliance (third-person singular simple present alliances, present participle alliancing, simple past and past participle allianced)

1. (obsolete) To connect or unite by alliance; to ally.

• “alliance”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “alliance”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• ancillae, canaille

alliance c (singular definite alliancen, plural indefinite alliancer)

1. an alliance

• “alliance” in Den Danske Ordbog

From allier +‎ -ance.

• IPA^(key): /a.ljɑ̃s/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɑ̃s

alliance f (plural alliances)

1. alliance, union
2. wedding ring

• → Polish: alians
• → Portuguese: aliança
• → Russian: алья́нс (alʹjáns), алья́нсъ (alʹjáns) — Pre-reform orthography (1918)
  • → Armenian: ալյանս (alyans)
  • → Kazakh: альянс (aläns)
• → Turkish: alyans

• “alliance”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• canaille

alliance

1. alternative form of alliaunce