Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
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;
pre["e]minence.
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.