Mastery

Origin

From Old French maistrie.

Full definition of mastery

Noun

1. The position or authority of a master; dominion; command; supremacy; superiority.
• Sir Walter Raleigh (ca.1554-1618)If divided by mountains, they will fight for the mastery of the passages of the tops.
• 1892, James Yoxall, The Lonely Pyramid Chapter 5, The desert storm was riding in its strength; the travellers lay beneath the mastery of the fell simoom. Whirling wreaths and columns of burning wind, rushed around and over them.
2. Superiority in war or competition; victory; triumph; preeminence.
• Exodus, xxxii. 18The voice of them that shout for mastery.
• 1 Corinthians, ix. 25.Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.
• Ben Jonson (1572-1637)O, but to have gulled him
  Had been a mastery.
3. (obsolete) Contest for superiority.
4. (obsolete) A masterly operation; a feat.
• Geoffrey Chaucer (c.1343-1400)I will do a maistrie ere I go.
5. (obsolete) The philosopher's stone.
6. The act or process of mastering; the state of having mastered; expertise.
• John Tillotson (1630-1694)He could attain to a mastery in all languages.
• John Locke (1632-1705)The learning and mastery of a tongue, being unpleasant in itself, should not be cumbered with other difficulties.