occasion
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: From Middle English occasioun, from Middle French occasion, from Old French occasiun, from Latin occāsiōnem, noun of action from perfect passive participle occāsus, from verb occidō, from prefix ob- (“down", "away”) + verb cadō (“fall”).
Inflected forms:
form: occasions
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: occasions
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: occasioning
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: occasioned
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: occasioned
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: A favorable opportunity; a convenient or timely chance.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: At this point, she seized the occasion to make her own observation.
Foꝛ ſynne toke occaſiõ by the meanes of the cõmaundement and ſo diſceaved me / and by the ſilfe cõmaundemẽt ſlewe me.
I'll take the occasion which he gives to bring / Him to his death.
That our Work, therefore, might be in no Danger of being likened to the Labours of theſe Hiſtorians, we have taken every Occaſion of interſpersing through the whole ſundry Similes, Deſcriptions, and other kind of poetical Embelliſhments.
gloss: The time when something happens.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: On this occasion, I'm going to decline your offer, but next time I might agree.
And Vickers launched forth in a tirade very different from his platform utterances. He spoke with supreme contempt of the dense stupidity exhibited on all occasions by the working classes. He said that if you wanted to do anything for them, you must rule them, not pamper them.
gloss: An occurrence or state of affairs which causes some event or reaction; a motive or reason.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: I had no occasion to feel offended, however.
gloss: Something which causes something else; a cause.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: [I]t were too vile to ſay, and ſcarce to be beleeued, what we endured: but the occaſion was our owne, for want of prouidence, induſtrie and gouernment, […]
gloss: An occurrence or incident.
pos: noun
tags: countable
obsolete
uncountable
gloss: A particular happening; an instance or time when something occurred.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: I could think of two separate occasions when she had deliberately lied to me.
a momentous occasion in the history of South Africa
I only think of you on two occasions / That's day and night / I'd go for broke if I could be with you / Only you can make it right
In the last two decades, North Korea has on various occasions conducted highly provocative missile and nuclear tests and promised to turn Seoul into a sea of fire.
gloss: A need; requirement, necessity.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: I have no occasion for firearms.
[…] after we have ſerved our ſelves, and our own occaſions.
When my occaſions took me into France, […]
I had occasion,[…], to make a somewhat long business trip to Chicago, and on my return,[…], I found Farrar awaiting me in the railway station. He smiled his wonted fraction by way of greeting,[…], and finally leading me to his buggy, turned and drove out of town. I was completely mystified at such an unusual proceeding.
gloss: A special event or function.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: Having people round for dinner was always quite an occasion at our house.
gloss: A reason or excuse; a motive; a persuasion.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: VVhoſe manner was all paſſengers to ſtay, / And entertaine with her occaſions ſly, […]
gloss: To cause; to produce; to induce
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: It is seen that the mental changes are occasioned by a change of polarity.
To the Author's private circle the appearance of this singular Work on Clothes must have occasioned little less surprise than it has to the rest of the world.
[…] although overcrowding on the trains running via London Bridge has occasioned considerable discomfort to regular travellers, it was noticed that the alternative route was not extensively patronised, and that the trains were seldom more than half-filled.
The new tunnel has been associated with, but not actually occasioned by, the electrification of the Manchester-Sheffield-Wath lines of the former L.N.E.R., initiated before the war.
In the early days of the Large Hadron Collider, when the megamachine kept running into seemingly endless, and increasingly improbable, financial and technical snags, some researchers—calling these mishaps “anti-miracles”—even half-seriously proposed that the universe was censoring us from this sort of destruction of the world occasioned by a successful run of the collider.
Derived words: improve the occasion
interoccasion
occasional
occasionless
occasionwear
on occasion
rise to the occasion
social occasion
take occasion
unoccasioned
Translations: