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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

plea.

An appeal, petition, urgent prayer or entreaty.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/pliː/

  1. An appeal, petition, urgent prayer or entreaty.

    a plea for mercy
    make a plea

  2. An excuse; an apology.

  3. That which is alleged or pleaded, in defense or in justification.

  4. That which is alleged by a party in support of his cause.

  5. An allegation of fact in a cause, as distinguished from a demurrer.

  6. The defendant’s answer to the plaintiff’s declaration and demand.

  7. A cause in court; a lawsuit; as, the Court of Common Pleas.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English ple, from Old French plait, plaid, from Medieval Latin placitum (“a decree, sentence, suit, plea, etc., Latin an opinion, determination, prescription, order; literally, that which is pleasing, pleasure”), neuter of placitus, past participle of placere (“to please”). Cognate with Spanish pleito (“lawsuit, suit”). Doublet of placit. See also please, pleasure.

verb/pliː/

  1. To plead; to argue.

    England · Scotland · regional
Where this word comes from

From Middle English ple, from Old French plait, plaid, from Medieval Latin placitum (“a decree, sentence, suit, plea, etc., Latin an opinion, determination, prescription, order; literally, that which is pleasing, pleasure”), neuter of placitus, past participle of placere (“to please”). Cognate with Spanish pleito (“lawsuit, suit”). Doublet of placit. See also please, pleasure.

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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.