voivodeship

English
WOTD – 11 November 2021

Etymology

From voivode (“local ruler or official in parts of central and eastern Europe; administrative chief in Poland”) +‎ -ship (suffix forming nouns indicating properties or states of being).[1] Voivode is variously derived from a number of Slavic languages including Bulgarian войвода (vojvoda), Czech vojevoda, Polish wojewoda, Russian воево́да (vojevóda), and Serbo-Croatian vojvoda, војвода, all from Proto-Slavic *vojevoda (“army leader; duke; warlord”), from *voji (“army”) (probably ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *weyh₁- (“to chase, pursue; to persecute; to suppress”)) + *-e- + *vodìti (“to conduct; to lead”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wedʰ- (“to lead”)). Sense 3 is a semantic loan from Polish województwo.

Pronunciation
  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈvɔɪˌvəʊdˌʃɪp/
  • Audio (Southern England)(file)
  • (General American) IPA(key): /ˈvɔɪˌvoʊdˌʃɪp/
  • Hyphenation: voi‧vode‧ship

Noun

voivodeship (countable and uncountable, plural voivodeships)

  1. (countable, uncountable) The office, position, rank, or title of a voivode (“a local ruler or official in various parts of central and eastern Europe; an administrative chief in modern Poland”).
  2. (countable, uncountable) The jurisdiction of a voivode, comparable to a countship or a county.
    Synonym: voivodate
  3. (countable) The highest-level administrative subdivision of Poland, comparable to a province or state.

Alternative forms

Translations

References
  1. “voivodeship, n.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, December 2020; “voivodeship, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Further reading
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