noun
confederacy
kuhn-FEH-duh-ruh-see
noun
1
An alliance or union of groups, states, or people joined for a common purpose.
"The tribes formed a confederacy to defend their shared territory."
"Historians study how the confederacy balanced power among its member states."
How to Use Confederacy
Learner’s notesIn plain EnglishA group of states or peoples who band together while each keeps most of its own independence.
Common mistake
Often capitalized as "the Confederacy" to refer specifically to the Confederate States of America during the US Civil War — lowercase "confederacy" is the general term for any such alliance.
Easily confused with
Word Forms
confederacies plural
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The tribes formed a _____ to defend their shared territory.
Etymology
From Anglo-Norman confederacie, from Latin cōnfoederātiō — a doublet of "confederation."