suit
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /suːt/
enpr: so͞ot
note: yod-coalescence
ipa: /ʃuːt/
note: Conservative
ipa: /sjuːt/
enpr: syo͞ot
note: without the yod-coalescence
ipa: /sɪu̯t/
enpr: syo͞ot
note: Indic
ipa: /syʈ/
homophone: suite (spelling pronunciation)
ipa: /sut/
note: Scotland, Northern Ireland, foot-goose merger
ipa: /sʉt/
homophone: soot
Forms: form: suits
Etymology: From Middle English sute, borrowed from Anglo-Norman suite and Old French sieute, siute (modern suite), originally a participle adjective from Vulgar Latin *sequita (for secūta), from Latin sequi (“to follow”), because the component garments "follow each other", i.e. are worn together. See also the doublet suite. Cognate with Italian seguire and Spanish seguir. Related to sue and segue.
Senses: examples: text: A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe.
ref: 1963, Margery Allingham, “Foreword”, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:
text: Think of banking today and the image is of grey-suited men in towering skyscrapers. Its future, however, is being shaped in converted warehouses and funky offices in San Francisco, New York and London, where bright young things in jeans and T-shirts huddle around laptops, sipping lattes or munching on free food.
ref: 2013 August 3, “Revenge of the nerds”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:
text: Nick hired a navy-blue suit for the wedding.
topics: business
clothing
fashion
lifestyle
manufacturing
textiles
glosses: A set of clothes to be worn together, now especially a man's matching jacket and trousers (also business suit or lounge suit), or a similar outfit for a woman.
glosses: A garment or set of garments suitable and/or required for a given task or activity: space suit, boiler suit, protective suit, swimsuit.
qualifier: women's speech
glosses: A dress.
examples: text: Be sure to keep your nose to the grindstone today; the suits are making a "surprise" visit to this department.
text: You had an army / Of suits behind you
ref: 1996, Ani DiFranco, “Napoleon”, in Dilate:
text: Two smartly dressed suits walked up to the doctor. "Are you alright Dr. La Perouse?"
ref: 2016, A.K. Brown, Jumpstart (Champagne Universe Series: Book 1), page 29:
text: Suits didn't wear suits any more—they wore Tibetan prayer beads coiled around their wrists. But they slithered in a suitlike way.
ref: 2020, Emily Segal, Mercury Retrograde, New York: Deluge Books, →ISBN:
glosses: A person who wears matching jacket and trousers, especially a boss or a supervisor.
glosses: A full set of armour.
examples: text: If you take my advice, you'll file a suit against him immediately.
topics: law
glosses: The attempt to gain an end by legal process; a process instituted in a court of law for the recovery of a right or claim; a lawsuit.
examples: text: Tam[burlaine]. Are you the wittie King of Perſea?
Myc[etes]. I marrie am I: haue you any ſute to me?
Tam[burlaine]. I woulde intreate you to ſpeake but three wiſe wordes.
ref: c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene iv:
glosses: Petition, request, entreaty.
glosses: The act of following or pursuing; pursuit, chase.
examples: text: Rebate your loves, each rival suit suspend,
 Till this funereal web my labors end.
ref: 1725–1726, Homer, “(please specify the book or chapter of the Odyssey)”, in [William Broome, Elijah Fenton, Alexander Pope], transl., The Odyssey of Homer. […], London: […] Bernard Lintot, →OCLC:
glosses: Pursuit of a love-interest; wooing, courtship.
examples: text: Thenceforth the suitt of earthly conquest shonne.
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 60:
glosses: The act of suing; the pursuit of a particular object or goal.
glosses: The full set of sails required for a ship.
examples: text: To deal and shuffle, to divide and sort
Her mingled suits and sequences.
ref: 1785, William Cowper, The Task:
topics: card-games
games
glosses: Each of the sets of a pack of cards distinguished by colour and/or specific emblems, such as the spades, hearts, diamonds, or clubs of traditional Anglo, Hispanic, and French playing cards.
examples: ref: 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Vicissitude of Things”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC:
text: Every five and thirty years the same kind and suit of weather comes again.
glosses: Regular order; succession.
glosses: A company of attendants or followers; a retinue.
examples: text: "You must wear these to-day, my dear child," said Lord Norbourne, as, entering the dressing-room of his daughter, he laid a suit of pearls on her table
ref: 1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, pages 212–213:
glosses: A group of similar or related objects or items considered as a whole; a suite (of rooms etc.)
Hyponyms: bathing suit
bite suit
diving suit
EVA suit
flight suit
Racal suit
shell suit
space suit
swimsuit
tracksuit
zoot suit
Derived terms: Adeli suit
airsuit
all over one like a cheap suit
amicable suit
antisuit
bathing suit
battlesuit
besuit
BIG suit
biosuit
birthday suit
birthday-suit
blue suit
bodysuit
bondage suit
bring suit
bunny suit
Buster Brown suit
catsuit
chemical suit
chem suit
civil suit
class suit
combat armor suit
combat armour suit
countersuit
cut one's cloth to suit one's purse
cybersuit
demob suit
dinner suit
ditto suit
diving-suit
dress suit
drysuit
empty suit
enviro-suit
established suit
exosuit
fatsuit
fat suit
firesuit
fold like a cheap suit
follow suit
friendly suit
fursuit
ghillie suit
giggle suit
gimp suit
goon suit
gorilla suit
gravity suit
G-suit
half-suit
hardsuit
hazmat suit
ice-cream suit
jump suit
jumpsuit
law suit
leisure suit
long suit
major suit
man-o'-war suit
Mao suit
meatsuit
minor suit
missuit
monkey suit
monosuit
morning suit
NBC suit
nightsuit
Noddy suit
non-suit
nonsuit
Nudie suit
offsuit
out of suits
oversuit
pants suit
pants-suit
pantsuit
pant suit
paternity suit
penguin suit
playsuit
poopy suit
power suit
pram suit
pressure suit
presuit
pumpkin suit
quad suit
rainsuit
reverse bunny suit
romper suit
safari suit
sailor suit
Santa suit
sauna suit
shell-suit
shooting suit
siren suit
skeleton suit
skinsuit
skirt suit
slack suit
sleeping suit
sleepsuit
snapsuit
snowsuit
soup-and-fish suit
strike suit
strong suit
suitability
suit and service
suit and tie
suit broker
suitcase
suitcoat
suit costs
suit court
suit covenant
suit custom
suiter
suit jacket
suitless
suitlike
suitlock
suitmaker
suitmaking
suit of armor
suit of armour
suit of dittoes
suitport
suit service
sunsuit
sweatsuit
swimsuit
tank suit
three-piece suit
tiddly suit
track suit
trouser suit
turtle suit
undersuit
union suit
unsuit
warsuit
wetsuit
wet suit
wingsuit
zuit suit
Related terms: prosecute
suitable
suite