Etimology
From Middle English knowleche, knaweleche, cnawlece (“knowledge”), from knowen (“to know, recognise”) + -leche. Related to Middle English knowlechen (“to find out, acknowledge”). For more on the Middle English suffix -leche, compare freelage. Compare also Old English cnāwelǣċ, cnāwelǣċing (“acknowledging, acknowledgement”).
noun
knowledge (usually uncountable, plural knowledges)
The fact of knowing about something; general understanding or familiarity with a subject, place, situation etc. [from 14th c.]
Awareness of a particular fact or situation; a state of having been informed or made aware of something. [from 14th c.]
Intellectual understanding; the state of appreciating truth or information. [from 14th c.]
Familiarity or understanding of a particular skill, branch of learning etc. [from 14th c.]
(philosophical) Justified true belief
(archaic or law) Sexual intimacy or intercourse (now usually in phrase carnal knowledge). [from 15th c.]
(obsolete) Information or intelligence about something; notice. [15th–18th c.]
The total of what is known; all information and products of learning. [from 16th c.]
(countable) Something that can be known; a branch of learning; a piece of information; a science. [from 16th c.]
(obsolete) Acknowledgement. [14th–16th c.]
(obsolete) Notice, awareness. [17th c.]
(UK, informal) The deep familiarity with certain routes and places of interest required by taxicab drivers working in London, England.
Examples
His knowledge of Iceland was limited to what he'd seen on the Travel Channel.
[N]ow ſuch a liue vngodly, vvithout a care of doing the wil of the Lord yet if they liue vngodly, they deny God, and therefore ſhal be denied, […]
The yawning gap in neuroscientists’ understanding of their topic is in the intermediate scale of the brain’s anatomy. Science has a passable knowledge of how individual nerve cells, known as neurons, work. It also knows which visible lobes and ganglia of the brain do what. But how the neurons are organised in these lobes and ganglia remains obscure.
He had always intended to visit him, though to the last always assuring his wife that he should not go; and till the evening after the visit was paid she had no knowledge of it.
Knowledge consists in recognizing the difference between good and bad decisions.
Our ſoules, whoſe faculties can comprehendThe wondrous Architecture of the world:And meaſure euery wandring planets courſe,Still climing after knowledge infinite, […]
Does your friend have any knowledge of hieroglyphs, perchance?
A secretary should have a good knowledge of shorthand.
Every time that he had knowledge of her he would leave, either in the bed, or in her cushion-cloth, or by her looking-glass, or in some place where she must needs find it, a piece of money […].
Item, if any ship be in danger […], every man to bear towards her, answering her with one light for a short time, and so to put it out again; thereby to give knowledge that they have seen her token.
His library contained the accumulated knowledge of the Greeks and Romans.
he weakened his braines much, as all men doe, who over nicely and greedily will search out those knowledges [translating cognoissances], which hang not for their mowing, nor pertaine unto them.
There is a great difference in the delivery of the mathematics, which are the most abstracted of knowledges.
Then she fell on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and said unto him, Why have I found grace in thine eyes, that thou shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger?
There is only one sure way to memorise the runs and that is to follow them, either on foot, cycle or motor cycle; hence, the familiar sight of would-be cabbies learning the knowledge during evenings and weekends.
Related words
synonyms
awareness
cognizance
ken
knowingness
learning
See Thesaurus:knowledge
antonyms
ignorance
hyponyms
background knowledge
book knowledge
carnal knowledge
common knowledge
foreknowledge
general knowledge
interknowledge
metaknowledge
prior knowledge
protoknowledge
public knowledge
reading knowledge
red flag knowledge
scientific knowledge
stock knowledge
traditional knowledge
working knowledge
related terms
know
knowing
verb
knowledge (third-person singular simple present knowledges, present participle knowledging, simple past and past participle knowledged)
(obsolete) To confess as true; to acknowledge. [13th–17th c.]
Examples
Then went oute to hym Jerusalem, and all Jury, and all the region rounde aboute Jordan, and were baptised of hym in Jordan, knoledging their synnes.