Phrase guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.
noun
An accomplishment; particularly one that is flaunted or boasted of.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: idiomatic
Synonyms: plume, notch in one's belt
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see feather, cap.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
History
The placing of a feather in a hat has been a symbol of achievement that has arisen in several cultures, apparently independently. The English writer and traveller Richard Hansard recorded it in his Description of Hungary, 1599: "It hath been an antient custom among them [Hungarians] that none should wear a fether but he who had killed a Turk, to whom onlie yt was lawful to shew the number of his slaine enemys by the number of fethers in his cappe." The Native American tradition of adding a feather to the head-dress of any warrior who performed a brave act is well known.
Across languages
11 source translations are retained for this English entry.
