Word.ws English Dictionary

mésalliance

/mɛˈzæli.əns/US/meɪ̯zəˈlaɪ̯əns/

mésalliance noun: marriage with a person of inferior social position.

Noun

mésalliance (plural mésalliances)

  1. Marriage with a person of inferior social position.
    • The case is very different in England, where a grocer's daughter would think she made a mésalliance by marrying a painter […]1840, M. A. Titmarsh [pseudonym; William Makepeace Thackeray], “On the French School of Painting”, in The Paris Sketch Book, volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: John Macrone, […], →OCLC
    • He had been revolving in his mind the marriage question pending between Jos and Rebecca, and was not over well pleased that a member of a family into which he, George Osborne, of the —th, was going to marry, should make a mésalliance with a little nobody–a little upstart governess.1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 6, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC

Examples of mésalliance in a sentence

  • Instances of such mésalliance would be as rare as those of intermarriage between the Anglo-Saxon emigrants and the Red Indians.1871, Edward Bulwer-Lytton (published anonymously), The Coming Race, Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, page 272:
  • To a mésalliance of that kind every globule of my ancestral blood spoke in opposition.1907, Ambrose Bierce, Beyond the Walls:
  • But if you marry the old count you will make his last days happy, and as widow of the Grand...the prince would no longer be making a mésalliance by marrying you.1941, Aylmer and Louise Maude translation of Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

Forms of mésalliance

pluralmésalliances
alternative formmesalliance

Origin of mésalliance

Borrowed from French mésalliance, from mésallier (“to misally”).

Questions about mésalliance

What does mésalliance mean?
Mésalliance means marriage with a person of inferior social position.
How do you use mésalliance in a sentence?
Instances of such mésalliance would be as rare as those of intermarriage between the Anglo-Saxon emigrants and the Red Indians.
What part of speech is mésalliance?
Mésalliance is a noun.
How do you pronounce mésalliance?
Mésalliance is pronounced /mɛˈzæli.əns/ (UK).
What is the plural of mésalliance?
The plural of mésalliance is mésalliances.

Words near mésalliance in the dictionary

  1. Mérida
  2. méridienne
  3. méridiennes
  4. Mérigon
  5. méringue
  6. mésalliance
  7. mésalliances
  8. méthode champenoise
  9. métier
  10. métiers
  11. métis

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: mésalliance (page history and authors). 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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Eleanorrrrrrrrrr-mésalliance.wav.

Cite this entry: “mésalliance.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/m%C3%A9salliance. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.