tourney
Americannoun
-
tourneys
plural
verb (used without object)
-
tourneys,
present (3rd person singular)
-
tourneyed,
past participle, past
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tourneying
present participle
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
tourneysimple
-
tourneyssimple
-
have tourneyedperfect
-
has tourneyedperfect
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am tourneyingprogressive
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are tourneyingprogressive
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is tourneyingprogressive
-
have been tourneyingperfect progressive
-
has been tourneyingperfect progressive
Past
-
tourneyedsimple
-
had tourneyedperfect
-
was tourneyingprogressive
-
were tourneyingprogressive
-
had been tourneyingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of tourney
1300–50; (v.) Middle English tourneyen < Old French torneier < Vulgar Latin *tornidiāre to wheel, keep turning; (noun) Middle English tourneie < Old French tournei, derivative of tourneier. See turn
Explanation
A tourney is a tournament: a sporting event that consists of a series of games that result in a champion. Tourney is an informal word for a tournament. A tourney is a series of games with a bunch of different teams or individuals. Tennis events like Wimbledon are tourneys. The playoffs for the NBA, NFL, and NHL are tourneys. In a tourney, you have to beat more than one team to become the champion or overall winner, and there are different rounds in which you face different opponents. A single sporting event — like a boxing match — is not a tourney.
Vocabulary lists containing tourney
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
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Tolkien Reading Day, List 11
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The Ruins of Gorlan
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
However, this tourney attracts lords and knights from great houses throughout Westeros, including a couple whose families figure prominently in “Game of Thrones.”
From Salon ● Jan. 17, 2026
The boy squire shines bright in the otherwise drab surrounds of the tourney campgrounds.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 16, 2026
Kang Ae-sim and Yang Dong-geun portray an elderly woman and her failson who enter the tourney to erase his mountainous debt.
From Salon ● Dec. 26, 2024
Eneasi Piuleini had 23 points and earned tourney MVP honors.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 23, 2024
A year ago, he had been with Stannis in King's Landing when King Robert staged a tourney for Prince Joffrey's name day.
From "A Clash of Kings" by George R.R. Martin
"I believe in these guys. I really do," said Chris Beard, who led the Red Raiders in five Big 12 tourneys but will be there with Texas for the first time.
From Fox News ● Mar. 8, 2022
The report released in August was sparked by outrage at the disparities between amenities at the two tourneys, including weight rooms and other features.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 30, 2021
Even in tourneys where knights display unadulterated mounted skills by putting lances through rings and other challenges, there’s room for audience participation.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 24, 2021
Rout says she likes the DGT 3000 and DGT 2010 clock models, which are easy to configure and work pleasantly in any context—nothing too ornate like the clocks you see at pro speed chess tourneys.
From Slate ● Feb. 24, 2021
Fabulous eaters arrived from everywhere to take part in the irrational tourneys of capacity and resistance that were organized in the house of Petra Cotes.
From "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
And the devise of a castle of cloth of gold, set with pomegranates about the battlements, with shields of knights hanging therefrom; and six knights in rich harness tourneyed.
From Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth by Lucy Aikin
In the days of Henry VIII. a chronicler tells of a jouster who "tourneyed in harneyse all of gilt from the head piece to the sabattons."
From Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages A Description of Mediaeval Workmanship in Several of the Departments of Applied Art, Together with Some Account of Special Artisans in the Early Renaissance by Julia de Wolf Gibbs Addison
Three days they tourneyed, but none could withstand Sir Guy's strong arm.
From Legends That Every Child Should Know; a Selection of the Great Legends of All Times for Young People by Hamilton Wright Mabie
Then the general tourney began, and, in double file, and much increased in numbers, our company sallied forth, and, as it behoved them, tourneyed bravely.
From The Book of the Duke of True Lovers by Christin? de Pisan
Glorious has the tourney been Where for me has fought the Queen; But a disgrace for me it were If I tourneyed not for her.
From Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres by Henry Adams
When the Cid began to war upon the town, and sent parties against it twice and thrice a day, for the Cid was alway upon the alert, there was fighting and tourneying every day.
From Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) by Various
There is nothing but tourneying, love-making, and enchantment.
From A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century by Henry A. (Henry Augustin) Beers
Another summer passed in tourneying, and during another winter he tried to amuse himself by making poetry for his lady.
From Studies in Medi?val Life and Literature by Edward Tompkins McLaughlin
Then was there great jousts and great tourneying, and many lords and ladies were at that feast, and Sir Tristram was most praised of all other.
From Le Mort d'Arthur: Volume 1 by Sir Thomas Malory
And if *so fall* the chiefetain be take *should happen* On either side, or elles slay his make*, *equal, match No longer then the tourneying shall last.
From The Canterbury Tales, and Other Poems by D. Laing Purves
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
