Mastery

Mas"ter*y (?), n.; pl. Masteries (#). [OF. maistrie.]

1. The position or authority of a master; dominion; command; supremacy; superiority.

If divided by mountains, they will fight for the mastery of the passages of the tops.
Sir W. Raleigh.

2. Superiority in war or competition; victory; triumph; preƫminence.

The voice of them that shout for mastery.
Ex. xxxii. 18.

Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.
1 Cor. ix. 25.

O, but to have gulled him
Had been a mastery.
B. Jonson.

3. Contest for superiority. [Obs.] Holland.

4. A masterly operation; a feat. [Obs.]

I will do a maistrie ere I go.
Chaucer.

5. Specifically, the philosopher's stone. [Obs.]

6. The act process of mastering; the state of having mastered.

He could attain to a mastery in all languages.
Tillotson.

The learning and mastery of a tongue, being unpleasant in itself, should not be cumbered with other difficulties.
Locke.