country
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Middle English contre, contree, contreie, from Old French contree, from Vulgar Latin (terra) contrāta (“(land) lying opposite; (land) spread before”), derived from Latin contra (“against, opposite”). Cognate with Scots kintra. Unrelated to county. Displaced native English land in some of its senses.
Pronunciation
Noun
country (countable and uncountable, plural countries)
- The territory of a nation, especially an independent nation state or formerly independent nation; a political entity asserting ultimate authority over a geographical area; a sovereign state. [from 14th c.]
- Synonyms: see Thesaurus:country
- 1935, George Goodchild, chapter 5, in Death on the Centre Court:
- By one o'clock the place was choc-a-bloc. […] The restaurant was packed, and the promenade between the two main courts and the subsidiary courts was thronged with healthy-looking youngish people, drawn to the Mecca of tennis from all parts of the country.
- 1986 April 15, Michael Parenti, 02:52, in U.S. interventionism, the Third World, and the USSR, Boulder, Colorado:
- But that expropriation of the Third World, [that] has been going on for 400 years, brings us to another revelation: namely, that the Third World is not poor. You don't go to poor countries to make money. There are very few poor countries in this world. Most countries are rich: the Philippines are rich, Brazil is rich, Mexico is rich, Chile is rich; only the people are poor. But there's billions to be made there, to be carved out, and to be taken; there's been billions for 400 years! The Capitalist European and North American powers have carved out and taken the timber, the flax, the hemp, the cocoa, the rum, the tin, the copper, the iron, the rubber, the bauxite, the slaves, and the cheap labour. They have taken out of these countries. These countries are not underdeveloped; they're overexploited!
- 1994, Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, London: Abacus, published 2010, page 3:
- It is a beautiful country of rolling hills, fertile valleys, and a thousand rivers and streams which keep the landscape green even in winter.
- 2010, The Economist, 3 Feb 2011:
- These days corporate Germany looks rather different. Volkswagen, the country’s leading carmaker, wants to be the world’s biggest by 2018.
- 2013 June 22, “T time”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 68:
- The ability to shift profits to low-tax countries by locating intellectual property in them, which is then licensed to related businesses in high-tax countries, is often assumed to be the preserve of high-tech companies.
- (uncountable, countable) A somewhat precisely delimited region of land having particular human occupation or agreed limits, especially inhabited by members of the same race, speakers of the same language etc., or associated with a given person, occupation, species etc. [from 13th c.]
- 2007 February 17, Chris Moss, The Guardian:
- This is condor country – the only region this far east where you can see the magnificent vulture – and a small national park straddling the passes, El Condorito, is a good stopover for walkers and birders.
- (especially British, uncountable, countable) An area of land; a district, region. [from 13th c.]
- 2010 March 7, David Vann, The Observer:
- We walk along flat, open country, red dirt and spinifex grass, a few short trees […].
- (uncountable, usually preceded by “the”) A rural area, as opposed to a town or city; the countryside. [from 16th c.]
- 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 17, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
- I was borne and brought up in the Countrie, and amidst husbandry […].
- 2000 March 4, Alexander Chancellor, The Guardian:
- I have always thought that one of the main reasons for the popularity of blood sports in the country is the pointlessness of going outdoors with no purpose or destination in mind.
- 2006 May, James B. Weld, Difficulties in Learning English as a Second or Foreign Language, Regis University, page 37:
- She grew up in Chang-hua, a city in central Taiwan with a decidedly country flavor.
- (Australia, usually capitalised) Traditional lands of Indigenous people with embedded cultural, spiritual, cosmological, ecological, and physical attributes and values.
- 1842 February 16, The Inquirer, Perth, page 5, column 2:
- "Me like my country — no much too hot, no much too cold. By and bye, white fellow come — soldier-man come. White fellow say, this our land, that our land — ALL country our land. Black fellow say no! my country no white fellow's country, and black fellow take spear.
- 1945 September 27, The Chronicle, Adelaide, page 35, column 4:
- "Yewi," he said, "me bin longa Fanny Bay gaol five years." On my asking why they put him in gaol he replied. "Australia your country, ain't it?" I replied, "Yes, him my country all right." "Well," he then said, "this my country here. Brinken country other side of the river ain't it?" "That's right," said I. "Well," said Jack, "supposem Japanese come longa this country and you killem, you good man, but suppose Brinken come longa my country here, and I kill him, police man put me longa Fanny Bay for five years. That is the law."
- 2008 July 23, The Torres News, page 5, column 1:
- "It demonstrates that having Indigenous people on country managing their lands, delivering environmental benefits for all Australians is an important asset for the national good."
- 2015 March 11, Calla Wahlquist, “Of three remote communities here, why are only the two Aboriginal ones under threat?”, in The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-10-07:
- Milgin says living on country, with elders, makes Aboriginal people "strong". That's backed up by a 2011 report on Aboriginal homelands by Amnesty International that found that living on homelands was connected to better health outcomes and drug rehabilitation.
- 2021 July 8, The Air Force News, page 16, column 2:
- What country do you live/work on? I work on Yuggera Yuggarapul country and I'm from Darwin, Larrakia country.
- Ellipsis of country music. [from 20th c.]
- a country song
- a country singer
- a country festival
- (informal) The spirit of the country (rural places): the spirit of country folkways; those folkways.
- you can take the boy out of the country, but you can't take the country out of the boy
- (mining) The rock through which a vein of ore or coal runs.
- Coordinate terms: gangue, overburden
Usage notes
The geographical sense of "country" usually refers to a sovereign state, that is, a nation with no administrative dependence on another one, which is the definition adopted in most world maps. In a broader sense, however, "country" may also refer to polities, or their territories, with some degree of autonomy and cultural identity but still under the sovereignty of another state. Examples of the latter include Scotland, Tibet, Abkhazia, and Greenland. Such usage may be interpreted as supporting secessionism of these polities by others.
Hyponyms
See also Thesaurus:country.
(Hyponyms of country (noun)):
Derived terms
- accession country
- across country
- alt-country
- alternative country
- another country heard from
- anticountry
- a prophet has no honor in his own country
- a prophet is not without honor save in his own country
- back country
- backcountry
- Black Country
- bro-country
- bro country
- Constable country
- constituent country
- countrification
- countrify
- country & western
- country-and-western
- country and western
- countryball
- country beam
- country beer
- country-blues
- country blues
- country bookie
- country box
- country bumpkin
- country captain
- country club
- country code
- country cousin
- country damage
- country-damaged
- country dance
- country-dance
- country dancing
- countryfication
- country fig
- countryfolk
- country-fried
- country-fried steak
- countryful
- country gentleman
- country gravy
- country ham
- countryhood
- country house
- countryhuman
- countryish
- country Joan
- country lane
- countryless
- countrylike
- countrymade
- countryman
- countrymate
- country merchant
- country mile
- country mouse
- country music
- country of origin
- country of provenance
- country park
- countryperson
- country pop
- country punk
- country rap
- country road
- country rock
- country-rock
- country sausage
- country seat
- countryship
- country ship
- countryside
- country-side
- country side
- country stop
- country store
- country team
- countryward
- countrywards
- countrywear
- country-western
- country-western music
- countrywide
- country wife
- country wine
- countrywoman
- cross-country
- cross country
- cross-country ski
- cross-country skier
- cross-country skiing
- cross country skiing
- cuntry
- developed country
- Elvis country
- flyover country
- foreign country
- free country
- fresh country egg
- fresh country eggs
- frontcountry
- go country
- God's country
- God's own country
- go to the country
- hill country blues
- home country
- host country
- in country
- in-country
- intercountry
- intracountry
- it's a free country
- line of country
- live off the country
- Lowcountry
- microcountry
- mini-independent country
- model country
- mother country
- multicountry
- neotraditional country
- new country project
- noncountry
- Nordic country
- north country
- old-time country
- outlaw country
- outside country
- pure country
- socialism in one country
- step-country
- third country
- tiger country
- transcountry
- Trump country
- up the country people
- X-country
Descendants
- Jamaican Creole: konchri
- Krio: kɔntri
- Nigerian Pidgin: kontri
- Sranan Tongo: kondre
- Tok Pisin: kantri
- → Arabic: كَانْتْرِي (kāntrī)
- ⇒ Chinese: 港腳 / 港脚 (gǎngjiǎo)
- → Finnish: country, kantri
- → French: country
- → Italian: country
- → Japanese: カントリー (kantorī)
- → Korean: 컨트리 (keonteuri)
- → Norwegian Bokmål: køntri
- → Norwegian Nynorsk: køntri
- → Polish: country
- → Portuguese: country
- → Romanian: country
- → Russian: ка́нтри (kántri)
- → Kazakh: кантри (kantri)
- → Spanish: country
- → Swedish: country
- → Ukrainian: ка́нтрі (kántri)
Translations
region of land
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nation state
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the country, rural area, as opposed to the town or city
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country music
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See also
Adjective
country (not comparable)
- From or in the countryside, connected with it, or typical of it.
- Things around here are just a little more country than what he's used to.
- 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
- When this conversation was repeated in detail within the hearing of the young woman in question, and undoubtedly for his benefit, Mr. Trevor threw shame to the winds and scandalized the Misses Brewster then and there by proclaiming his father to have been a country storekeeper.
- Of or connected to country music.
- They're mainly a hard rock band, but their new album sounds kinda country to me.
- (India, historical) Originating in India rather than being imported from Europe or elsewhere.
- 1872, Silk in India, page 16:
- We have seen that the Company manufactured silk stuffs at three of its Residencies, but from country-wound silk.
- 1884, Journal of the United Service Institution of India, page 185:
- A reference to the Annual Administration Reports of the Department of Horse-breeding Operations […] will allow of the opinion being arrived at, that the breed of country horses under the present regime is steadily improving.
- 1937, Brigadier-General H. A. Young, The East India Company’s Arsenals & Manufactories:
- Country harness costs nearly as much, lasts half the time, and is in every respect inferior. It is understood that the only reason is that the Court desires to improve and encourage Indian manufactures.
Related terms
Translations
of, from or pertaining to the countryside (adjective)
|
References
- “country”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- country in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
- "country" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 81.
- William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “country”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
Basque
Pronunciation
Noun
country inan
Declension
| indefinite | singular | |
|---|---|---|
| absolutive | country | country-a |
| ergative | — | country-ak |
| dative | — | country-ari |
| genitive | — | country-aren |
| comitative | — | country-arekin |
| causative | — | country-arengatik |
| benefactive | — | country-arentzat |
| instrumental | country-z | country-az |
| inessive | — | country-an |
| locative | — | — |
| allative | — | — |
| terminative | — | — |
| directive | — | — |
| destinative | — | — |
| ablative | — | — |
| partitive | country-rik | — |
| prolative | country-tzat | — |
Further reading
- “country”, in Euskaltzaindiaren Hiztegia [Dictionary of the Basque Academy] (in Basque), Euskaltzaindia [Royal Academy of the Basque Language]
Finnish
Alternative forms
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
country
Declension
| Inflection of country (Kotus type 1/valo, no gradation) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| nominative | country | — | |
| genitive | countryn | — | |
| partitive | countrya | — | |
| illative | countryyn | — | |
| singular | plural | ||
| nominative | country | — | |
| accusative | nom. | country | — |
| gen. | countryn | ||
| genitive | countryn | — | |
| partitive | countrya | — | |
| inessive | countryssa | — | |
| elative | countrysta | — | |
| illative | countryyn | — | |
| adessive | countrylla | — | |
| ablative | countrylta | — | |
| allative | countrylle | — | |
| essive | countryna | — | |
| translative | countryksi | — | |
| abessive | countrytta | — | |
| instructive | — | — | |
| comitative | See the possessive forms below. | ||
| Possessive forms of country (Kotus type 1/valo, no gradation) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Synonyms
Derived terms
(compounds):
Further reading
- “country”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish] (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-02
French
Etymology
Pronunciation
Noun
country m (uncountable)
Italian
Polish
Portuguese
Romanian
Spanish
Swedish
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