different between acquaintanceship vs intimacy

English

Etymology

From acquaintance +? -ship.

Noun

acquaintanceship (usually uncountable, plural acquaintanceships)

1. (uncountable) The state of being acquainted.

   Synonym: acquaintance

   • 1640, John Day, The Knave in Graine, New Vampt, London, Act III, Scene 1,^[1]

     What, eschew acquaintanceship? forget, After my most hearty commendations, my very trusty friend, ’Twere sin and shame Tomaso.

   • 1889, Edmund Doidge Anderson Morshead (translator), The Libation-Bearers, in The House of Atreus, page 114

     To host and hostess thus with fortune blest,
     Lief had I come with better news to bear
     Unto your greeting and acquaintanceship;

   • 1915, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Anne of the Island, Chapter 5,^[2]

     Without effort, she took them with her into her ever widening circle of acquaintanceship, and the two Avonlea girls found their social pathway at Redmond made very easy and pleasant for them […]

   • 1971, E. M. Forster, Maurice, Penguin, 1972, Chapter 33, p. 143,^[3]

     When they talked down the telephone he heard a man whom he might respect at the other end of it — a fellow who sounded willing to let bygones be bygones and passion acquaintanceship.

2. (countable) A relationship as acquaintances.
   • 1753, George Wollaston, The Life and History of a Pilgrim, Dublin, Book 2, p. 137,^[4]

     They began their acquaintanceship very lovingly, and after a shake or two by the hand, Bell gave him a more particular account of the uses and sanctity of his office […]

   • 1897, Bram Stoker, Dracula, London: Constable, Chapter 4, p. 42,^[5]

     I have already spoken to them through my window to begin an acquaintanceship.

   • 1905, William John Locke, The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne, Part 2, Chapter 21,^[6]

     A growing distaste for the forced acquaintanceships of travel and a craving for home brought me back.

   • 1979, Patrick White, The Twyborn Affair, Penguin, 1981, Part 2, pp. 133-134,^[7]

     It was an acquaintanceship formed partly out of boredom, partly for mutual protection […]

   • 2013, Richard Flanagan, The Narrow Road to the Deep North, Part 2, Chapter 15,^[8]

     […] because she felt a strange freedom—even a security—in having decided that no acquaintanceship could end in anything untoward, she felt emboldened to sometimes do and say such things to men […]

Related terms

• acquaint
• acquaintance
• acquainted
• unacquainted

Translations

English

Etymology

intimate +? -cy

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??n.t?.m?.si/

Noun

intimacy (countable and uncountable, plural intimacies)

1. (uncountable, countable) Feeling or atmosphere of closeness and openness towards someone else, not necessarily involving sexuality.
   • 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Section 13.6^[1]

     To adulterous lust the most sacred duties are sacrificed, because, before marriage, men, by a promiscuous intimacy with women, learned to consider love as a selfish gratification—learned to separate it not only from esteem, but from the affection merely built on habit, which mixes a little humanity with it.

   • 1879, Robert Louis Stevenson, “Truth of Intercourse” in Essays, English and American, The Harvard Classics, Volume 28, edited by Charles W. Eliot, New York: P.F. Collier & Son, 1910, p. 287,^[2]

     The habitual liar may be a very honest fellow, and live truly with his wife and friends; while another man who never told a formal falsehood in his life may yet be himself one lie—heart and face, from top to bottom. This is the kind of lie which poisons intimacy.

   • 1908, Jack London, “To Build a Fire” in Lost Face, London: Mills & Boon, 1916,^[3]

     […] there was keen intimacy between the dog and the man.
2. (countable) Intimate relationship.
   • 1787, Robert Burns, Letter to Dr. Moore, 23 April, 1787, in J. Logie Robertson (ed.), The Letters of Robert Burns, Selected and Arranged, with an Introduction, London: Walter Scott, 1887, p. 57,^[5]

     I have formed many intimacies and friendships here, but I am afraid they are all of too tender a construction to bear carriage a hundred and fifty miles.

   • 1815, Jane Austen, Emma, Volume I, Chapter 8,^[6]

     “I have always thought it a very foolish intimacy,” said Mr. Knightley presently, “though I have kept my thoughts to myself; but I now perceive that it will be a very unfortunate one for Harriet […] ”

   • 1899, Henry James, The Awkward Age, Book One, Chapter 2,^[7]

     “ […] it isn’t my notion of the way to bring up a girl to give her up, in extreme youth, to an intimacy with a young married woman who’s both unhappy and silly, whose conversation has absolutely no limits, who says everything that comes into her head and talks to the poor child about God only knows what […] ”

3. (countable, especially plural) Intimate detail, (item of) intimate information.
   • 1961, V. S. Naipaul, A House for Mr Biswas, Vintage International, 2001, Part One, Chapter 4,

     He recognized the tone as the one used by friendly sisters to discuss the infirmities of their husbands. It was Shama’s plea to a sister to exchange intimacies, to show support.

Antonyms

• solitude

Related terms

• intimate
• intimation

Translations

Anagrams

• imitancy, minacity