[syn: fortune, destiny, fate, luck, lot, circumstances, portion]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Fortune \For"tune\ (f[^o]r"t[-u]n; 135), n. [F. fortune, L.
fortuna; akin to fors, fortis, chance, prob. fr. ferre to
bear, bring. See Bear to support, and cf. Fortuitous.]
1. The arrival of something in a sudden or unexpected manner;
chance; accident; luck; hap; also, the personified or
deified power regarded as determining human success,
apportioning happiness and unhappiness, and distributing
arbitrarily or fortuitously the lots of life.
[1913 Webster]
'T is more by fortune, lady, than by merit. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
O Fortune, Fortune, all men call thee fickle.
--Shak.
[1913 Webster]
2. That which befalls or is to befall one; lot in life, or
event in any particular undertaking; fate; destiny; as, to
tell one's fortune.
[1913 Webster]
You, who men's fortunes in their faces read.
--Cowley.
[1913 Webster]
3. That which comes as the result of an undertaking or of a
course of action; good or ill success; especially,
favorable issue; happy event; success; prosperity as
reached partly by chance and partly by effort.
[1913 Webster]
Our equal crimes shall equal fortune give. --Dryden.
[1913 Webster]
There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.
--Shak.
[1913 Webster]
His father dying, he was driven to seek his fortune.
--Swift.
[1913 Webster]
4. Wealth; large possessions; large estate; riches; as, a
gentleman of fortune.
Syn: Chance; accident; luck; fate.
[1913 Webster]
Fortune book, a book supposed to reveal future events to
those who consult it. --Crashaw.
Fortune hunter, one who seeks to acquire wealth by
marriage.
Fortune teller, one who professes to tell future events in
the life of another.
Fortune telling, the practice or art of professing to
reveal future events in the life of another.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Fortune \For"tune\, v. t. [OF. fortuner, L. fortunare. See
Fortune, n.]
1. To make fortunate; to give either good or bad fortune to.
[Obs.] --Chaucer.
[1913 Webster]
2. To provide with a fortune. --Richardson.
[1913 Webster]
3. To presage; to tell the fortune of. [Obs.] --Dryden.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Fortune \For"tune\, v. i.
To fall out; to happen.
[1913 Webster]
It fortuned the same night that a Christian, serving a
Turk in the camp, secretely gave the watchmen warning.
--Knolles.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
fortune
n 1: an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that causes an
event to result one way rather than another; "bad luck
caused his downfall"; "we ran into each other by pure
chance" [syn: luck, fortune, chance, hazard]
2: a large amount of wealth or prosperity
3: an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that leads to a
favorable outcome; "it was my good luck to be there"; "they
say luck is a lady"; "it was as if fortune guided his hand"
[syn: luck, fortune]
4: your overall circumstances or condition in life (including
everything that happens to you); "whatever my fortune may
be"; "deserved a better fate"; "has a happy lot"; "the luck
of the Irish"; "a victim of circumstances"; "success that was
her portion" [syn: fortune, destiny, fate, luck,
lot, circumstances, portion]
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
179 Moby Thesaurus words for "fortune":
Clio, Friday, Friday the thirteenth, Muse of history,
accidentality, actuarial calculation, adventitiousness, adventures,
affluence, annals, appointed lot, assets, astral influences,
astrology, autobiography, beggared, biographical sketch, biography,
blessing, bomb, boodle, book of fate, bottomless purse, break,
bulging purse, bundle, calculated risk, case history, casualness,
chance, chronicle, chronicles, chronology, circumstances,
confessions, constellation, cup, curriculum vitae, destination,
destiny, destitute, diary, dies funestis, doom, easy circumstances,
embarras de richesses, end, estate, expectations, experiences,
fatality, fate, felicity, flier, flukiness, foredoom,
fortuitousness, fortuity, fortunateness, fortuneless, fortunes,
future, gamble, gold, good fortune, good luck, hagiography,
hagiology, handsome fortune, hap, happenstance, happy chance,
happy fortune, hazard, heedless hap, high income, high tax bracket,
historiography, history, holdings, how they fall, ides of March,
impecunious, impoverished, independence, indeterminacy,
indeterminateness, indigent, inevitability, journal, karma, kismet,
law of averages, legend, life, life and letters, life story, lot,
luck, luckiness, lucre, luxuriousness, mammon, martyrology,
material wealth, means, memoir, memoirs, memorabilia, memorial,
memorials, mint, moira, money, money to burn, moneybags, necrology,
needy, obituary, opportunity, opulence, opulency, packet, pelf,
penurious, photobiography, pile, planets, play, plunge, portion,
position, possessions, pot, poverty-stricken, pretty penny,
principle of indeterminacy, probability, problematicness, profile,
property, prosperity, prosperousness, random sample, record,
resources, resume, riches, richness, risk, roll, run of luck,
serendipity, six-figure income, smiles of fortune, speculation,
stars, statistical probability, story, substance, the breaks,
theory of history, theory of probability, tidy sum, treasure,
uncertainty, uncertainty principle, unlucky day, unprosperous,
upper bracket, venture, wad, wealth, wealthiness, weird,
whatever comes, wheel of fortune, will of Heaven, worth