Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A man who is courting a woman.
  • noun A person who makes a petition or request.
  • noun Law A person who sues in court; a plaintiff; a petitioner.
  • noun A person or entity trying to acquire a controlling interest in a company, as by purchasing sufficient shares of its stock.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In law, a party to a suit or litigation.
  • noun One who sues, petitions, solicits, or entreats; a petitioner.
  • noun One who sues for the hand of a woman in marriage; a wooer; one who courts a mistress.
  • To play the suitor; woo; make love.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who sues, petitions, or entreats; a petitioner; an applicant.
  • noun Especially, one who solicits a woman in marriage; a wooer; a lover.
  • noun (Law) One who sues or prosecutes a demand in court; a party to a suit, as a plaintiff, petitioner, etc.
  • noun (O. Eng. Law) One who attends a court as plaintiff, defendant, petitioner, appellant, witness, juror, or the like.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun law A party to a suit or litigation.
  • noun One who sues, petitions, solicits, or entreats; a petitioner.
  • noun One who sues for the hand of a woman in marriage; a wooer; one who courts a mistress.
  • verb To play the suitor; to woo; to make love.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a man who courts a woman

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, plaintiff, from Anglo-Norman, from Latin secūtor, follower, from secūtus, past participle of sequī, to follow; see sekw- in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • Review: Forgetting the fact that the "suitor" is actually the girl's cousin and that the girl is fifteen years old - because that whole thing's a little creepy - this hardly qualifies as a time travel story just because two captains travel around the world in opposite directions so that each is one calendar day off from local time.

    REVIEW: Time Machines edited by Bill Adler, Jr. 2005

  • She called her suitor “Isidore:” this, however, she intimated was not his real name, but one by which it pleased her to baptize him — his own, she hinted, not being

    Villette 2003

  • He asked her why she did not accept the titled suitor and she replied that titles had no attraction for her, that her mind was made up; there was somebody she liked very much, he might ask her to be his wife some day and she would wait.

    The Rider in Khaki A Novel Nat Gould 1888

  • She called her suitor "Isidore:" this, however, she intimated was not his real name, but one by which it pleased her to baptize him

    Villette Charlotte Bront�� 1835

  • On the move: City will want to hold on to Bellamy, while Spurs boss Harry Redknapp - a long term suitor - can offer Champions League football

    Football.co.uk news feed 2010

  • The third remaining suitor is Italian carmaker Fiat (FIA. MI), which is also in the running to take over another of GM's European units, Germany's Opel, the paper added.

    Saab History 2009

  • Whether the suitor is the appealing Hippolitus or the vile Duke de Luovo, the effect of the marriage plot on Emilia and Julia is the same: separation. [

    Money, Matrimony, and Memory: Secondary Heroines in Radcliffe, Austen, and Cooper 2006

  • "detailed discussions" with several interested parties - not least long-term suitor EA - but has concluded that moving forward as an independent business would be in the best interests of its shareholders.

    The game retail industry according to MCV 2008

  • In Pride and Prejudice, as an example, Darcy, Elizabeth’s suitor, is a serious character who is contrasted with Elizabeth’s sister Lydia’s suitor, Wickham, a wacky con man.

    Writer Unboxed » Blog Archive » Characters 2008

  • It's about how to tell if your suitor is a serial killer, how to escape from a bad date.

    Periscope 2007

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