Etimology
From Middle English chance, cheance, chaunce, cheaunce, a borrowing from Old French cheance (“accident, chance, luck”), from Vulgar Latin *cadentia (“falling”), from Latin cadere (“to fall, to die, to happen, occur”). Doublet of cadence and cadenza.
noun
chance (countable and uncountable, plural chances)
(countable) An opportunity or possibility.
(uncountable) Random occurrence; luck.
(countable) The probability of something happening.
(in plural as chances) probability; possibility.
(countable, archaic) What befalls or happens to a person; their lot or fate.
Examples
We had the chance to meet the president last week.
Here was my chance. I took the old man aside, and two or three glasses of Old Crow launched him into reminiscence.
It never even occurred to me in my fondest dreams that I might have the chance to help the sons and daughters of those students and to help people like them all over this country.But now I do have that chance, and I'll let you in on a secret: I mean to use it.
Why leave it to chance when a few simple steps will secure the desired outcome?
There is a 30 percent chance of rain tomorrow.
Sometimes the name is changed because it is thought to be unlucky. If "Chua" is ill, the chances are that there are certain spirits who do not like his name, so the parents alter his name to "Mee," or something else, and then he gets well again.
Wild-visag'd Wanderer! ah for thy heavy chance!
Related words
synonyms
(random occurrence): fortune, hap; see also Thesaurus:luck
adjective
chance (not comparable)
Happening by chance, casual.
Examples
No crowd was about the door; no people were discernible at any of the many windows; not even a chance passer-by was in the street. An unnatural silence and desertion reigned there.
Heaven knows what pains the author has been at, what bitter experiences he has endured and what heartache suffered, to give some chance reader a few hours' relaxation or to while away the tedium of a journey.
adverb
chance (not comparable)
(obsolete) Perchance; perhaps.
Etimology
From Middle English chancen, chauncen, from the noun (see above).
verb
chance (third-person singular simple present chances, present participle chancing, simple past and past participle chanced)
(archaic, intransitive) To happen by chance, to occur.
(archaic, transitive) To befall; to happen to.
To try or risk.
To discover something by chance.
(Belize) To rob, cheat or swindle someone.
(Nigeria) To take an opportunity from someone; to cut a queue.
Examples
It chanced that I found a solution the very next day.
if a bird's nest chance to be before thee
Once […] it chanced that Geoffrey Riddell Bishop of Ely, a Prelate rather troublesome to our Abbot, made a request of him for timber from his woods towards certain edifices going on at Glemsford.
Mr. Mason, shivering as some one chanced to open the door, asked for more coal to be put on the fire, which had burnt out its flame, though its mass of cinder still shone hot and red. The footman who brought the coal, in going out, stopped near Mr. Eshton's chair, and said something to him in a low voice, of which I heard only the words, "old woman,"—"quite troublesome."
[…] while the King and Godwine sate at the table, accompanied with others of the nobilitie, it chanced the cupbearer to slip with the one foote, and yet by good strength of his other leg, to recover himselfe without falling […]
Shall we carry the umbrella, or chance a rainstorm?
He does chance it in stocks, but he's always played on the square, if you call stocks gambling.
He chanced upon a kindly stranger who showed him the way.
I chanced on this letter.
The car broke down a week after I bought it. I was chanced by that fast-talking salesman.
Be prepared to engage in protests of all businesses nationwide who are violating the copyright act and chancing our members.
Related words
synonyms
(to happen) come to pass, occur, transpire; See also Thesaurus:happen
(to happen to)
(to try) test
(to discover something) come across, come on, come upon, encounter, stumble upon
(to cheat someone) deceive, fool, trick; See also Thesaurus:deceive