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/kˈɑmənwˌɛlθ/ Listen

noun

Commonwealth n.

A state; a body politic consisting of a certain number of men, united, by compact or tacit agreement, under one form of government and system of laws. "The trappings of a monarchy would set up an ordinary commonwealth." Note: This term is applied to governments which are considered as free or popular, but rarely, or improperly, to an absolute government. The word signifies, strictly, the common well-being or happiness; and hence, a form of government in which the general welfare is regarded rather than the welfare of any class.

The whole body of people in a state; the public.

(Eng. Hist.) Specifically, the form of government established on the death of Charles I., in 1649, which existed under Oliver Cromwell and his son Richard, ending with the abdication of the latter in 1659.

Synonyms: State; realm; republic.

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Etymology of 'Commonwealth'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Commonwealth" Quotes from Famous Books

... he calls 'the cant transmitted from age to age in praise of the ancient Romans.' Ante, i. 311. To do so with Johnson was at once to provoke an attack, for he looked upon the Roman commonwealth as one 'which grew great only by the misery of the rest of mankind.' Ib. Moreover he disliked appeals to history. 'General history,' writes Murphy (Life, p. 138), 'had little of his regard. Biography was his delight. Sooner than hear of the Punic War he would ...

— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... Reformation been paid by an organized community. Individuals walking in advance of their age had enunciated such truths, and their voices had seemed to die away, but at last, a little, struggling, half-developed commonwealth had proclaimed the rights of conscience ...

— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various

... uncouth in their courtly speeches, prolix in their battles, silly in their arguments, absurd in their travels, and, in short, wanting in everything like intelligent art; for which reason they deserve to be banished from the Christian commonwealth ...

— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... struggle between the kings and their subjects was the bitter feud between the Sadducees and the Pharisees. Normal party rivalry grew into murderous hatred, and in taking revenge upon each other they brought ruin upon the commonwealth. The final end was hastened by the suicidal feud between the brothers Hyrcanus and Aristobulus, fomented by the unprincipled machinations of the Idumean Antipater. In the final crisis the Pharisaic policy of submission and of peace ...

— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent

... "to" and "for" recurred in subsequent years and again reflected the lack of precision in this matter as well as the seeming misapprehension in England that the servant was entitled to a fifty-acre grant. Under the articles of the treaty of 1651 between Virginia and the commissioners of the Commonwealth, the reversion to the term "for every person" was made and the policy of no land to servants was implicit in the sixth article of the agreement: "That the priviledge of haveing fiftie acres of land for every person transported in the collony shall ...

— Mother Earth - Land Grants in Virginia 1607-1699 • W. Stitt Robinson, Jr.

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