mastery

noun

1. (uncountable, usually)The position or authority of a master; dominion; command; supremacy; superiority.

   “If divided by mountains, they will fight for the mastery of the passages of the tops.”

   “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. (uncountable, usually)Superiority in war or competition; victory; triumph; preeminence.

   “They were faire Ladies, till they fondly ſtriu’d / With th’Heliconian maides for mayſtery; / Of whom they ouer-comen, were depriu’d / Of their proud beautie, and th’one moyity / Transform’d to fiſh, for their bold ſurquedry, / But th’vpper halfe their hew retayned ſtill, / And their ſweet skill in wonted melody; / Which euer after they abuſd to ill, / T’allure weake traueillers, whom gotten they did kill.”

   “The voice of them that shout for mastery.”

   “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.”

   “O, but to ha' gulled him / Had been a mastery.”

3. (uncountable, usually)The act or process of mastering; the state of having mastered; expertise.

   “He […]could attain to a mastery in all languages.”

   “The learning and mastery of a tongue, being unpleasant in itself, should not be cumbered with other difficulties.”

   “At Tebay however, he began to get the mastery over these untoward conditions, and actually got back a little time up to Shap, after which all was plain sailing.”

4. (obsolete, uncountable, usually)A contest for superiority.

   “[…] pastimes of wrestling, and like maſteries betweene the Citizens of London and others of the Suburbes […]”

   “Rury has given the word for some rare sport — a bout of games and masteries between me and Marcos Serkman to prove which is the better man.”

   “Come, Paolo, we two have never held / A mastery between us — tell me out!”

5. (obsolete, uncountable, usually)A masterly operation; a feat.

   “Ye welsh men..brake out vpon the Englysshe men in ye Bordour..and there made masteryes for a whyle.”

   “That ye maye knowe..what masteryes they haue played.”

   “By a number of odde speeches..you doo yet suppose to haue wrought a mastery.”

   “Why, thou cowardly knave, no stronger than a duck, Darest thou try masteries with me a-pluck.”

   “To accomplish this is a great mastery, a rare mastery: but it is an accomplishment that seems to have been Rowlandson's easily whenever he would.”

6. (obsolete, uncountable, usually)The philosopher's stone.