feud

Definition

A state of long-standing mutual hostility.

Etymology

Inherited from Northern Middle English fede, feide, from Old French faide, feide, fede, from Proto-West Germanic *faihiþu (“hatred, enmity”) (corresponding to foe + -th), from Proto-Indo-European *peyḱ- (“hostile”). Cognate to Old English fǣhþ, fǣhþu, fǣhþo (“hostility, enmity, violence, revenge, vendetta”), German Fehde, and Dutch vete (“feud”) (directly inherited from Proto-West Germanic) alongside Danish fejde (“feud, enmity, hostility, war”) and Swedish fejd (“feud, controversy, quarrel, strife”) (borrowed from Middle Low German).

Example Sentences

• "You couldn't call it a feud exactly, but there had always been a chill between Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods."
• "Mr. Cumming’s Dionysus in “The Bacchae” is conceived as a rock star, the rhythm-and-blues Maenads as his backup singers and groupies, and his feud with his cousin Pentheus, king of Thebes, as an encounter of the hedonistic, ambigendered, exotic Other, with “the fear of letting that into your culture,” Mr. Tiffany said."
• "The feuds between Namsang and Borduria continued. In 1875-76 the dispute between the Namsang and Borduria arose about the buffaloes which were carried off by Borduria people from Namsang areas."