Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • preposition In the capacity or character of; as.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An old Scotch form of who.
  • As being; so far as.
  • noun A jail; quod.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • conjunction In so far as; in the capacity or character of; as.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adverb In the capacity of.
  • preposition in the capacity of

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin quā, feminine ablative sing. of quī, who; see kwo- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin qua ("in the capacity of").

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Examples

Comments

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  • "in the capacity of"

    April 25, 2008

  • Not quite a Greek Remark, as is my list title, but its use in Arisotle warrants its inclusion.

    August 15, 2008

  • Only used in Aristotle in Latin translations of Aristotle, however. The corresponding Greek word, if it was used, would begin with /p/.

    August 15, 2008

  • Actually, it looks like Aristotle didn't use anything; I just looked at a manuscript translated "man qua man" and it was just "anthropos anthropou"...

    August 15, 2008

  • In the opera "The Barber of Seville", everyone's favorite (mine, anyway) aria is "Figaro", wherein we hear, Eh, Figaro, son qua!" Followed by Figaro si, Figaro la, etc. Robin Williams sings it at the beginning of "Mrs. Doubtfire", while dubbing the voices of Tweety and Sylvester.

    June 24, 2009