Lealness

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The state of being steadfastly devoted and faithful to a person, cause, or obligation
2. The characteristic of remaining true and loyal through duty or genuine commitment to someone or something
3. The quality of showing constant allegiance and trustworthiness in one's devotion to another

Etymology: "Leal" is a Scots and northern English adjective meaning loyal, faithful, or true, and "lealness" is simply that quality with the suffix "-ness" added, the same ending that turns "kind" into "kindness" or "good" into "goodness". The noun is therefore a plain formation on an existing word rather than a loanword with a dramatic past. The more interesting thread is that "lealness" is a doublet of two other English nouns, "legalness" and "loyalness". Doublets are words that arrive in a language by different routes yet grew from the same ancestor, and here the shared ancestor is the Latin "legalis", meaning relating to law, which gave English "legal" through French and the Old French "leal" with its sense of loyal and true. Over time the adjective "leal" in Scots kept the older sense of faithfulness, while the English "loyal" was borrowed later from French with a stronger connection to allegiance to a sovereign.

Synonyms: loyalty, faithfulness, allegiance

Antonyms: disloyalty, betrayal, treachery