ASCENDANT • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Ascendant

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/əsˈɛndənt/ Listen

noun

Ascendant n.

1.

Ascent; height; elevation. (R.) "Sciences that were then in their highest ascendant."

2.

(Astrol.) The horoscope, or that degree of the ecliptic which rises above the horizon at the moment of one's birth; supposed to have a commanding influence on a person's life and fortune. Note: Hence the phrases To be in the ascendant, to have commanding power or influence, and Lord of the ascendant, one who has possession of such power or influence; as, to rule, for a while, lord of the ascendant.

3.

Superiority, or commanding influence; ascendency; as, one man has the ascendant over another. "Chievres had acquired over the mind of the young monarch the ascendant not only of a tutor, but of a parent."

4.

An ancestor, or one who precedes in genealogy or degrees of kindred; a relative in the ascending line; a progenitor; opposed to descendant.

adjective

Ascendent, Ascendant adj.

1.

Rising toward the zenith; above the horizon. "The constellation... about that time ascendant."

2.

Rising; ascending.

3.

Superior; surpassing; ruling. "An ascendant spirit over him." "The ascendant community obtained a surplus of wealth." "Without some power of persuading or confuting, of defending himself against accusations,... no man could possibly hold an ascendent position."

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Etymology of 'Ascendant'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Ascendant" Quotes from Famous Books

... complain. For myself I hate to think of the coming severance; but if it must come, why not by your hands as well as by any other? It is hardly possible that you in your heart should love a Protestant ascendant Church. But, as Barrington says, a horse won't get oats unless he works ...

— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope

... smiling, I pledged them back, and answered with a jest. For rising, I bowed before Cleopatra and craved leave to go. "Venus," I said, speaking of the planet that we know as Donaou in the morning and Bonou in the evening, "was in the ascendant. Therefore, as new-crowned King of Love, I must now pass to do my homage to its Queen." For these barbarians ...

— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard

... opportunity to retire from parliamentary life. He had expressed that intention several months before. He wrote to Holton, on May 13th, 1867, "My fixed determination is to see the Liberal party re-united and in the ascendant, and then make my bow as a politician. As a journalist and a citizen, I hope always to be found on the right side and heartily supporting my old friends. But I want to be free to write of men and things without control, beyond that which my conscientious convictions and the interests ...

— George Brown • John Lewis

... Association? I do not say that for all these evils—the Empire is exclusively responsible. To a certain degree they are found in all rich communities, especially where democracy is more or less in the ascendant. To a certain extent they exist in the large towns of Germany; they are conspicuously increasing in England; they are acknowledged to be dangerous in the United States of America; they are, I am told on good authority, ...

— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... cruelty, and because they appealed to the political sympathies of comparatively few. In the time of Judge Thorpe, Wyatt and Willcocks, the dominating class not only held a monopoly of power, but they and their adherents were numerically in the ascendant. At the time of Gourlay's persecution the population was much more evenly divided. The oligarchy still had control of all the avenues to power, but there was a large and steadily-increasing class ...

— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent

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