litany
/ˈlɪtəni/
litany noun: a ritual liturgical prayer in which a series of prayers recited by a leader are alternated with responses from the congregation.
Noun
litany (plural litanies)
- A ritual liturgical prayer in which a series of prayers recited by a leader are alternated with responses from the congregation.
- Synonyms:
- call and response
- A prolonged or tedious list.
- Near-synonym: jeremiad
- The litany of packaging innovations introduced to or popularized in the U.S. food market over the last generation seems endless: flexible aseptic packaging, barrier plastics, squeezables, lightweight glass, the retort pouch, […]1988, Prepared Foods, volume 157, numbers 11-13, page 9
- Synonyms:
- laundry list, jeremiad
litany meaning in Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Indonesian
litany in Tamil
- பாசுரத்தொகுதி, இறைமுறையீட்டுப் பாசுரத் தொகுதி, வழிபாட்டிலும், மத ஊர்வலங்களிலும் குருமாரும் மக்களுக்காக, மாறிமாறிப் பாட்டினை, பல்லவியாகப் பாடுவதற்கு
litany in Bengali
- পুনরাবৃত্ত প্রার্থনা, দীর্ঘ তালিকা
litany in Malayalam
- prayer, invocation, supplication
- പൊതുഅനുതാപപ്രാർത്ഥന, മെമ്രാ, പ്രാർത്ഥന, പ്രാർത്ഥനം, കീർത്തനം, ഈശ്വരസ്തുതി
- recitation, recital, repetition
- ഉരുവിടൽ, ജപം, ജാപം, ജപിക്കൽ, ആവർത്തച്ചു ചൊല്ലൽ, ആവർത്തനം
litany in Indonesian
- ritual liturgical prayer
- litani
Examples of litany in a sentence
- To that end he had sent his men among the common folk of the town, from whom came a litany of tales that led Hawk to a stunningly wrong conclusion.2009 July 22, Josie Litton, Come Back to Me: A Novel (Viking & Saxon), Random House Publishing Group, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 102:
- There are, to be sure, some differences in how the candidates propose addressing this litany of concerns.2016 January 30, “America deserves more from presidential hopefuls”, in The National, archived from the original on 17 Feb 2016, retrieved...
- [Sam Bankman-Fried] is charged with a litany of fraud and campaign finance law violations, in what US prosecutors are calling “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history”.2022 December 15, David A Banks, “Crypto was supposed to solve financial corruption. The FTX scandal shows it’s got worse”, in The...
Synonyms of litany
Forms of litany
| plural | litanies |
|---|
Origin of litany
From Middle English, from Old French letanie, from Latin litania, from Ancient Greek λιτανεία (litaneía, “prayer”), from λιτή (litḗ, “prayer, entreaty”).
Words formed from litany
Phrases with litany
Questions about litany
- What does litany mean?
- Litany means a ritual liturgical prayer in which a series of prayers recited by a leader are alternated with responses from the congregation.
- What is litany in Tamil?
- Litany in Tamil is பாசுரத்தொகுதி, இறைமுறையீட்டுப் பாசுரத் தொகுதி, வழிபாட்டிலும். See Litany meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use litany in a sentence?
- To that end he had sent his men among the common folk of the town, from whom came a litany of tales that led Hawk to a stunningly wrong conclusion.
- What part of speech is litany?
- Litany is a noun.
- How do you pronounce litany?
- Litany is pronounced /ˈlɪtəni/.
- What is the plural of litany?
- The plural of litany is litanies.
Words near litany in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: litany (page history and authors); litany (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); litany (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); litany (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-litany.wav.
Cite this entry: “litany.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/litany. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.