duel.
Arranged, regular combat between two private persons, often over a matter of honor.
Meaning & usage
Arranged, regular combat between two private persons, often over a matter of honor.
Historically, the wager of battle (judicial combat).
Any battle or struggle between two contending persons, forces, groups, or ideas.
a sniper duel
Where this word comes from
From Medieval Latin duellum (“fight between two men, duel”), itself from Old Latin duellum (“war, fight”), which survived in Classical Latin as a rare byform of bellum and was later reinterpreted as “duel” by unetymological association with duo (“two”). May have entered English through Middle French duel.
To engage in a battle.
The two dogs were duelling for the bone.
Where this word comes from
From Medieval Latin duellum (“fight between two men, duel”), itself from Old Latin duellum (“war, fight”), which survived in Classical Latin as a rare byform of bellum and was later reinterpreted as “duel” by unetymological association with duo (“two”). May have entered English through Middle French duel.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.