puissance

See also: Puissance

English

WOTD – 9 November 2016

German equestrian Otto Ammermann and his horse Servus competing in a puissance event (sense 2) in Wilhelmshaven, Lower Saxony, Germany, in September 1965

Alternative forms

• Puissance (show jumping)

Etymology

From Middle English puissaunce, from Anglo-Norman puissance, pusaunce, and other forms, from Old French puissant (“powerful”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈpjuːɪ.s(ə)ns/, /ˈpwɪ-/

• Audio (Received Pronunciation):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: puis‧sance

Noun

puissance (countable and uncountable, plural puissances)

1. Power, might or potency.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza XVII, pages 23–24:

     The Sarazin ſore daunted with the buffe / Snatcheth his ſword, and fiercely to him flies; / Who well it wards, and quyteth cuff with cuff: / Each others equall puiſſaunce enuies, / And through their iron ſides with cruelties / Does ſeeke to perce: repining courage yields / No foote to foe.

   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     We easily pronounce puissance, truth and justice; they be words importing some great matter, but that thing we neither see nor conceive.

   • 1824, J[ohn] Johnson, “74. The same [i.e., The Ordynarye of Crysten Men]. Emprynted in the cyte of London in the Flete strete in the sygne of y^e sonne by Wynkyn de Worde y^e yere our lorde m.ccccc.vj. Quarto.”, in Typographia, or The Printers' Instructor: Including an Account of the Origin of Printing, with Biographical Notices of the Printers of England, from Caxton to the Close of the Sixteenth Century: A Series of Ancient and Modern Alphabets, and Domesday Characters. Together with an Elucidation of Every Subject Connected with the Art, volume I, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, & Green, Paternoster Row, →OCLC, page 255:

     After these things above said, the Priest exorcised the salt, saying thus: I conjure thee, creature of salt; that is to say, I conjure in thee the puissance of the Devil in Hell, in the name of God Father omnipotent, and in the charity of our Lord Jesu Christ, and in the virtue of the Holy Ghost […]

   • 2006, Clive James, North Face of Soho: Unreliable Memoirs. Vol. IV, London: Picador, ISBN 978-0-330-48128-1; republished London: Picador, 2007, ISBN 978-0-330-48127-4, page 66:

     Any impression of mental puissance might have been increased by the fact that I was usually to be seen working hard with notebook and biro, shaping up a new book review or a linking script […].

2. (equestrianism) The high-jump component of the sport of show jumping.
   • 1969, G. H. S. Webber, Show Jumping International, London: Evans Brothers; New York, N.Y.: Van Nostrand Reinhold, →OCLC, page 126:

     It was in Dublin that San Lucas scored his first success in what has become something of a speciality for him, the puissance.

   • 2011 April, Stuart Turner, Harnessing Horsepower: The Pat Moss Carlsson Story, Poundbury, Dorset: Veloce Publishing, →ISBN, page 23:

     Pat [Moss] then went to Oxford to qualify for the Horse of the Year Show, and Danny was fourth in the Puissance, an event with very high jumps.

   • 2013, Hilary M. Clayton, P. René van Weeren, “Performance in Equestrian Sports”, in Willem Back, Hilary M. Clayton, editors, Equine Locomotion, 2nd edition, Edinburgh, New York, N.Y.: Saunders, →ISBN, page 332:

     In a study of horses during a puissance competition that started at a height of 1.80 m and ended in the last round at 2.27 m, success was significantly positively correlated with the following variables at lift-off: vertical velocity of CM, height of CM, distance of CM from the fence; and was significantly negatively correlated with the distance of the leading hind limb to the CM.

Translations

power, might or potency

• Bulgarian: мощ (bg) f (mošt), могъщество (bg) n (mogǎštestvo)
• French: puissance (fr) f
• Russian: власть (ru) f (vlastʹ), могу́щество (ru) n (mogúščestvo)

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French puissance, derived from Old French puissant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɥi.sɑ̃s/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɑ̃s

Noun

puissance f (plural puissances)

1. power (physical or figuratively)
2. dominion (state within the British Empire)

Derived terms

• en puissance
• grande puissance
• puissance coloniale
• puissance de feu
• puissance mondiale
• puissance nucléaire

 

Related terms

• pouvoir

Preposition

puissance

1. (mathematics) to the power of

   Deux puissance quatre égale seize.

   Two to the power of four equals sixteen.

Further reading

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

Middle French

Etymology

From Old French puissance.

Noun

puissance f (plural puissances)

1. power

Descendants

• French: puissance

Old French

Alternative forms

• poiessance
• poixance
• possance
• poxance
• poissance
• poissanche
• poussance
• puissence
• puissaunce
• pusance
• pusaunce
• pussance
• pussaunce

Etymology

From puissant, pussant.

Noun

puissance oblique singular, f (oblique plural puissances, nominative singular puissance, nominative plural puissances)

1. power; ability; authority
2. might; strength

Descendants

• English: puissance (borrowed through Anglo-Norman)
• Middle French: puissance
  • French: puissance