Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
noun
- a piece of landed property, especially one of large extent with an elaborate house on it: to have an estate in the country.
- Law.
- property or possessions.
- the legal position or status of an owner, considered with respect to property owned in land or other things.
- the degree or quantity of interest that a person has in land with respect to the nature of the right, its duration, or its relation to the rights of others.
- interest, ownership, or property in land or other things.
- the property of a deceased person, a bankrupt, etc., viewed as an aggregate.
- British. a housing development.
- a period or condition of life: to attain to man’s estate.
- a major political or social group or class, especially one once having specific political powers, as the clergy, nobles, and commons in France or the lords spiritual, lords temporal, and commons in England.
- condition or circumstances with reference to worldly prosperity, estimation, etc.; social status or rank.
- Obsolete. pomp or state.
- Obsolete. high social status or rank.
verb (used with object), es·tat·ed, es·tat·ing.
- Obsolete. to establish in or as in an estate.
noun
- a large piece of landed property, esp in the country
- mainly British a large area of property development, esp of new houses or (trading estate) of factories
- property law
- property or possessions
- the nature of interest that a person has in land or other property, esp in relation to the right of others
- the total extent of the real and personal property of a deceased person or bankrupt
- Also called: estate of the realm an order or class of persons in a political community, regarded collectively as a part of the body politic: usually regarded as being the lords temporal (peers), lords spiritual, and commonsSee also States General, fourth estate
- state, period, or position in life, esp with regard to wealth or social standingyouth’s estate; a poor man’s estate
early 13c., “rank, standing, condition,” from Anglo-French astat, Old French estat “state, position, condition, health, status, legal estate” (Modern French état), from Latin status “state or condition,” from root of stare “to stand” from PIE root *sta- “to stand” (see stet).
For initial e-, see especial. Sense of “property” is late 14c., from that of “worldly prosperity;” specific application to “landed property” (usually of large extent) is first recorded in American English 1620s. A native word for this was Middle English ethel (Old English æðel) “ancestral land or estate, patrimony.” Meaning “collective assets of a dead person or debtor” is from 1830.
The three estates (in Sweden and Aragon, four) conceived as orders in the body politic date from late 14c. In France, they are the clergy, nobles, and townsmen; in England, originally the clergy, barons, and commons, later Lords Spiritual, Lords Temporal, and commons. For Fourth Estate see four.