different between accident vs vicissitude

English

Etymology

• First attested in the late 14th century. From Middle English, from Old French accident, from Latin accid?ns, present active participle of accid? (“happen”); from ad (“to”) + cad? (“fall”). See cadence, case. In the sense "unintended pregnancy", first attested in 1932.

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /?æk.s?.d?nt/, /?æk.s?.d?nt/

Noun

accident (countable and uncountable, plural accidents)

1. An unexpected event with negative consequences occurring without the intention of the one suffering the consequences.
   • c.1603, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Othello, The Moor of Venice, I-iii,

     Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances, / Of moving accidents by flood and field […]

2. (transport, vehicles) Especially, a collision or similar unintended event that causes damage or death.
3. Any chance event.
4. (uncountable) Chance.
   • c.1861-1863, Richard Chevenix Trench, in 1888, Letters and memorials, Volume 1,

     Thou cam'st not to thy place by accident, / It is the very place God meant for thee; […]
5. Any property, fact, or relation that is the result of chance or is nonessential.
   • 1883, J. P. Mahaffy, Social life in Greece from Homer to Menander,

     This accident, as I call it, of Athens being situated some miles from the sea, which is rather the consequence of its being a very ancient site, […]

6. (euphemistic) An instance of incontinence.
   • 2009, Marcia Stedron, My Roller Coaster Life as an Army Wife, Xlibris Corporation, ?ISBN, page 56:

     We weren’t there long when Karin asked about our dog. When we told her Chris was in the car, she insisted we bring him up to the apartment. I rejected her offer and said he might have an accident on the carpet and I didn’t want to worry about it.

7. (euphemistic) An unintended pregnancy.
9. (philosophy, logic) A quality or attribute in distinction from the substance, as sweetness, softness.
   • 1902, William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Folio Society 2008, page 171:

     If they went through their growth-crisis in other faiths and other countries, although the essence of the change would be the same […] , its accidents would be different.

10. (grammar) A property attached to a word, but not essential to it, such as gender, number, or case.
    • a 1799, John Parkhurst, A Hebrew and English lexicon without points, page 25

      An adjective, so called because adjectitious, or added to a substantive, denotes some quality or accident of the substantive to which it is joined […]

11. (geology) An irregular surface feature with no apparent cause.
12. (geology) A sudden discontinuity of ground such as fault of great thickness, bed or lentil of unstable ground.
13. (heraldry) A point or mark which may be retained or omitted in a coat of arms.
14. (law) casus; such unforeseen, extraordinary, extraneous interference as is out of the range of ordinary calculation.
15. (uncountable, philosophy, uncommon) Appearance, manifestation.
    • 14thC, Geoffrey Chaucer, The Pardoner's Prologue and Tale in The Canterbury Tales,

      These cookes how they stamp, and strain, and grind, / And turne substance into accident, / To fulfill all thy likerous talent!

    • 1677, Heraclitus Christianus: or, the Man of Sorrow, chapter 3, page 14:

      But as to Man, all the Fruits of the Earth, all sorts of Herbs, Plants and Roots, the Fishes of the Sea, and the Birds of the Air do not suffice him, but he must disguise, vary, and sophisticate, change the substance into accident, that by such irritations as these, Nature might be provoked, and as it were necessitated.

Synonyms

• (unexpected event with negative consequences): mishap
• (unexpected event that takes place without foresight or expectation): befalling, chance, contingency, casualty; See also Thesaurus:accident
• (chance): fortune, luck; see also Thesaurus:luck
• (law): casus

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

References

• Elisabetta Lonati, "Allas, the shorte throte, the tendre mouth": the sins of the mouth in The Canterbury Tales, in Thou sittest at another boke, volume 3 (2008, ISSN 1974-0603), page 253: "the cooks "turnen substance into accident" (Pd 539), transform the raw material, its natural essence, into the outward aspect by which it is known."
• Barbara Fass Leavy, To Blight With Plague: Studies in a Literary Theme (1993), page 47:

  To turn substance into accident is to give external form to what previously was unformed, to transform spirit into matter, to reduce eternal truths to their ephemeral physical manifestations.

Further reading

• accident in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• accident in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• accident at OneLook Dictionary Search

Catalan

Etymology

From Latin accid?ns, present active participle of accid? (“happen”).

Pronunciation

• (Balearic) IPA^(key): /?k.si?dent/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /?k.si?den/
• (Valencian) IPA^(key): /ak.si?dent/

Noun

accident m (plural accidents)

1. accident (a chance occurrence)
2. (grammar) accident
3. (music) accidental
4. (logic) accident
5. (transport) accident
6. (geography) feature

Derived terms

• accidentar
• accidentogen

Related terms

• accidental

Further reading

• “accident” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “accident” in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana.
• “accident” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “accident” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Dutch

Etymology

From Middle Dutch accident, from Middle French accident.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??k.si?d?nt/
• Hyphenation: ac?ci?dent
• Rhymes: -?nt

Noun

accident n (plural accidenten, diminutive accidentje n)

1. (philosophy, theology) accidental property
2. (now Belgium) accident

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ak.si.d??/

Noun

accident m (plural accidents)

1. accident

Derived terms

• accident de décompression
• accident de parcours
• accident de travail/accident du travail
• accident vasculaire cérébral
• accidentel
• accidenter

Further reading

• “accident” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Latin

Etymology 1

Form of the verb accid? (“I fall down upon”).

Verb

accident

1. third-person plural future active indicative of accid?

Etymology 2

Form of the verb acc?d? (“I cut down”).

Verb

acc?dent

1. third-person plural future active indicative of acc?d?

Middle French

Noun

accident m (plural accidens)

1. accident (unexpected outcome)

Old French

Noun

accident m (oblique plural accidenz or accidentz, nominative singular accidenz or accidentz, nominative plural accident)

1. accident (chance occurrence)
2. symptom (medical)

Descendants

• English: accident
• French: accident

Romanian

Etymology

From French accident

Noun

accident n (plural accidente)

1. accident

Declension

Scots

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?aks?d?nt]

Noun

accident (plural accidents)

1. An accident; a coincidental occurence or event.

References

• Eagle, Andy, editor (2016) The Online Scots Dictionary, Scots Online.

English

Etymology

From Middle French vicissitude, from Latin vicissit?d? (“change”), from vicissim (“on the other hand, in turn”), from vicis (“change, vicissitude”), whence Spanish vez and French fois (“time (as in "next time"), occurrence”).

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): [v??s?s.??t(j)u(?)d], [va??s?s.??t(j)u(?)d]
• Hyphenation: vi?cis?si?tude

Noun

vicissitude (plural vicissitudes)

1. Regular change or succession from one thing to another, or one part of a cycle to the next; alternation; mutual succession; interchange.

   Synonym: (informal) ups and downs

2. (often in the plural) A change, especially in one's life or fortunes.
   • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, vii, 351,

     And God made.. the Stars, and set them in the firmament of Heaven to illuminate the Earth, and rule the day in their vicissitude...

   • 1789, George Washington, First Inaugural Address

     Among the vicissitudes incident to life, no event could have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which the notification was transmitted by your order, and received on the fourteenth day of the present month.

   • 2003, "US redeployments afoot in Asia", Christian Science Monitor, Nov. 18, Pg. 6.,

     The vicissitudes of war in Iraq cast a dreary backdrop for Donald Rumsfeld's first visit to Asian military allies since he became US Defense Secretary in 2001.

Related terms

Translations

References

Further reading

• vicissitude in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• vicissitude in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• vicissitude at OneLook Dictionary Search

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from French vicissitude.

Noun

vicissitude f (plural vicissitudes, diminutive vicissitudetje n)

1. vicissitude

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin vicissit?d?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vi.si.si.tyd/

Noun

vicissitude f (plural vicissitudes)

1. vicissitude

Further reading

• “vicissitude” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Portuguese

Noun

vicissitude f (plural vicissitudes)

1. vicissitude (regular change or succession from one thing to another)
2. an unfortunate occurrence

   Synonyms: revés, infortúnio