Definition
nounA feeling of desire for new and exciting things.
nounA remarkable occurrence; a striking event.
Sentence Examples
Dangers give relish to an adventure.
I went to the South Pacific for a summer of romantic adventure.
It was a daring adventure, full of thrill and excitement.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd
Proto-Italic *ad
Proto-Italic *ad-
Vulgar Latin ad-
Proto-Indo-European *gʷem-
Proto-Indo-European *-yéti
Proto-Indo-European *gʷm̥yéti
Proto-Italic *gʷənjō
Vulgar Latin veniō
Vulgar Latin adveniō
Vulgar Latin adventūrus
Vulgar Latin *adventūra
Old French aventurebor.
Middle English aventure
English adventure
From Middle English aventure, aunter, anter, from Old French aventure, from Vulgar Latin *adventūra, from Latin adventūrus (“about to arrive, (Vulgar Latin) about to happen”), future active participle of adveniō (“to arrive”), which in the Romance languages took the sense of "to happen, befall" (see also advene). By surface analysis, advent + -ure.
Compare Scots adventur, Swedish äventyr, German Abenteuer.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"He loved excitement and adventure."
— 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter XII, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:
"The first thing to strike me about Spyplane was that it is more like a verbal simulation than an adventure."
— 1984 May, “Spyplane”, in Crash, number 4, (review):
"To sum up, I think this is definitely one of the best adventures around for the Spectrum now, along with Gnome Ranger[...]"
— 1988 May, Mike Gerrard, “The Guild of Thieves [review]”, in Your Sinclair, number 29, archived from the original on 26 May 2013:
"Before you sit down in front of your Speccy to play an adventure, equip yourself with a pencil, eraser and plenty of paper. This so that you may draw a 'map' of the adventure as you move around."
— 1992 October, Larry Horsfield, “The SU Guide to Playing and Writing Adventure Games”, in Sinclair User, number 128:
"He was in great adventure of his life."
— 1895, Lord Berners, transl., The Chronicles of Froissart: