Fief is an English word of 4 letters with synonyms like estate or land. Below you'll find 10+ example sentences showing how it's used in practice.
Fief meaning
- Land held of a superior, particularly on condition of homage, fealty, and personal service, especially military service.
- Synonym of estate: any land, when considered as a region over which the owner exercises lordly control.
- A territory, a domain, an area over which one exercises lordly control, particularly with regard to corporate or governmental bureaucracies.
Using Fief
- The main meaning on this page is: Land held of a superior, particularly on condition of homage, fealty, and personal service, especially military service. | Synonym of estate: any land, when considered as a region over which the owner exercises lordly control. | A territory, a domain, an area over which one exercises lordly control, particularly with regard to corporate or governmental bureaucracies.
- Useful related words include: feoff, estate, land, landed estate.
- In the example corpus, fief often appears in combinations such as: as fief, fief of, the fief.
Context around Fief
- Average sentence length in these examples: 28.1 words
- Position in the sentence: 4 start, 7 middle, 9 end
- Sentence types: 20 statements, 0 questions, 0 exclamations
Corpus analysis for Fief
- In this selection, "fief" usually appears near the end of the sentence. The average example has 28.1 words, and this corpus slice is mostly made up of statements.
- Around the word, danish, german and personal stand out and add context to how "fief" is used.
- Recognizable usage signals include as a fief and a danish fief and holstein. That gives this page its own corpus information beyond isolated example sentences.
- By corpus frequency, "fief" sits close to words such as abaribe, abbasids and abstentions, which helps place it inside the broader word index.
Example types with fief
The same corpus examples are grouped by length and sentence type, making it easier to see the contexts in which the word appears:
As compensation, the German king gave Henry IV the Bohemian County of Kladsko as a fief. (16 words)
And facilitated by an era of opaqueness and unaccountability, they have converted this place into a personal fief. (18 words)
Like a king, the marquess collected a portion of the tax revenues in his fief as personal income. (18 words)
During the First Crusade Petra was occupied by Baldwin I of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and formed the second fief of the barony of Al Karak (in the lordship of Oultrejordain ) with the title Château de la Valée de Moyse or Sela. (42 words)
Following these wars, Périgord, fief of Henry of Navarre, was to return to the Crown for good and would continue to suffer from the sudden political changes of the French nation, from the Revolution to the tragic hours of the Resistance. (41 words)
After a short communal phase and a series of pestilences and earthquakes, the city in the 15th century became an Aragonese possession, and was given in fief to the barons of the Tramontano family. (34 words)
Example sentences (20)
Denmark was long in disputes with Sweden over control of Skånelandene and with Germany over control of Schleswig (a Danish fief ) and Holstein (a German fief).
Brooks Willamette Valley Pinot Noir, bottles from left, Jo Landron Muscadet Le Fief du Breil and Wade Cellars Chenin Blanc.
And facilitated by an era of opaqueness and unaccountability, they have converted this place into a personal fief.
After a short communal phase and a series of pestilences and earthquakes, the city in the 15th century became an Aragonese possession, and was given in fief to the barons of the Tramontano family.
All of these rich territories were held in fief under other more senior feudal lords, particularly under various lines of the Habsburg family, to which many Liechtensteins were close advisors.
A lord was in broad terms a noble who held land, a vassal was a person who was granted possession of the land by the lord, and the land was known as a fief.
Amalric agreed and ascended the throne without a wife, although Agnes continued to hold the title Countess of Jaffa and Ascalon and received a pension from that fief's income.
As compensation, the German king gave Henry IV the Bohemian County of Kladsko as a fief.
Consequently, Europe's Catholic monarchs considered Ireland a feudal fief of the Papacy, to be granted to any Catholic sovereign who managed to secure the island Kingdom from the control of its Protestant monarchs.
Coronation of Charlemagne Charlemagne's father, Pepin, defended the papacy against the Lombards and issued the Donation of Pepin, which granted the land around Rome to the pope as a fief.
During the First Crusade Petra was occupied by Baldwin I of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and formed the second fief of the barony of Al Karak (in the lordship of Oultrejordain ) with the title Château de la Valée de Moyse or Sela.
Following these wars, Périgord, fief of Henry of Navarre, was to return to the Crown for good and would continue to suffer from the sudden political changes of the French nation, from the Revolution to the tragic hours of the Resistance.
He issued two public letters, saying that with the help of England he had reclaimed his kingdom, and acknowledged that Scotland had always been a fief of England.
In exchange for the use of the fief and the protection of the lord, the vassal would provide some sort of service to the lord.
In the south, Naples was a fief of the Pope, but its ruler, King Ferrante, refused to acknowledge the Pope's authority.
Lewis said the origin of 'fief' is not feudum (or feodum), but rather foderum, the earliest attested use being in Astronomus 's Vita Hludovici (840).
Like a king, the marquess collected a portion of the tax revenues in his fief as personal income.
Most of his fief were located in northern Lazio, but he entered in the Neapolitan orbit when in 1418 he was called by Sergianni Caracciolo to fight against the Angevine troops, which he defeated.
Roger offered to give Apulia as a fief of the Empire to one of his sons and give another son as a hostage; terms which Lothair refused after being pressured by Innocent.
Tang is said to have given the small state of Qi as a fief to the remnants of the Xia ruling family.
Common combinations with fief
These word pairs occur most frequently in English texts:
- as fief 8×
- fief of 7×
- the fief 5×
- his fief 5×
- fief to 3×
- fief and 2×
- in fief 2×
- fief as 2×