Profession

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: pro=fes=sion

CIDE DICTIONARY

Profession, n. [F., fr. L. professio. See Profess, v.].

•  The act of professing or claiming; open declaration; public avowal or acknowledgment; as, professions of friendship; a profession of faith.  [1913 Webster]

  "A solemn vow, promise, and profession."  [1913 Webster]
•  That which one professed; a declaration; an avowal; a claim; as, his professions are insincere.  [1913 Webster]

  "The Indians quickly perceive the coincidence or the contradiction between professions and conduct."  [1913 Webster]
•  That of which one professed knowledge; the occupation, if not mechanical, agricultural, or the like, to which one devotes one's self; the business which one professes to understand, and to follow for subsistence; calling; vocation; employment; as, the profession of arms; the profession of a clergyman, lawyer, or physician; the profession of lecturer on chemistry.  [1913 Webster]

  " The three professions, or learned professions, are, especially, theology, law, and medicine."  [1913 Webster]

  "Hi tried five or six professions in turn."  [1913 Webster]
•  The collective body of persons engaged in a calling; as, the profession distrust him.  [1913 Webster]
•  The act of entering, or becoming a member of, a religious order.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Profession, n.
1 a vocation or calling, esp. one that involves some branch of advanced learning or science (the medical profession).
2 a body of people engaged in a profession.
3 a declaration or avowal.
4 a declaration of belief in a religion.
5 a the declaration or vows made on entering a religious order. b the ceremony or fact of being professed in a religious order.

Idiom

the oldest profession colloq. or joc. prostitution.

Derivative

professionless adj.

Etymology

ME f. OF f. L professio -onis (as PROFESS)

THESAURUS

Profession

acceptance, acknowledgment, admission, affidavit, affirmance, affirmation, allegation, allowance, announcement, annunciation, appreciation, art, assertion, asseveration, attest, attestation, averment, avouchment, avowal, business, calling, career, career building, careerism, claim, compurgation, concession, conclusion, confession, confession of faith, craft, creed, declaration, declaration of faith, deposition, dictum, disclosure, employment, enunciation, field, game, handicraft, instrument in proof, ipse dixit, job, legal evidence, lifework, line, line of business, line of work, manifesto, metier, mission, mystery, number, occupation, position, position paper, positive declaration, post, practice, predicate, predication, proclamation, pronouncement, proposition, protest, protestation, pursuit, racket, recognition, say, say-so, saying, situation, specialization, specialty, sphere, stance, stand, statement, sworn evidence, sworn statement, sworn testimony, testimonial, testimonium, testimony, trade, utterance, vocation, vouch, walk, walk of life, witness, word, work

ROGET THESAURUS

Profession

Business

N business, occupation, employment, pursuit, what one is doing, what one is about, affair, concern, matter, case, matter in hand, irons in the fire, thing to do, agendum, task, work, job, chore, errand, commission, mission, charge, care, duty, part, role, cue, province, function, lookout, department, capacity, sphere, orb, field, line, walk, walk of life, beat, round, routine, race, career, office, place, post, chargeship, incumbency, living, situation, berth, employ, service, engagement, undertaking, vocation, calling, profession, cloth, faculty, industry, art, industrial arts, craft, mystery, handicraft, trade, exercise, work, avocation, press of business, businesslike, workaday, professional, official, functional, busy, on hand, in hand, in one's hands, afoot, on foot, on the anvil, going on, acting, in the course of business, all in one's day's work, professionally Adj, a business with an income at its heels, amoto quaeramus seria ludo, par negotiis neque supra.

Promise

N promise, undertaking, word, troth, plight, pledge, parole, word of honor, vow, oath, profession, assurance, warranty, guarantee, insurance, obligation, contract, stipulation, engagement, preengagement, affiance, betroth, betrothal, betrothment, promising, promissory, votive, under hand and seal, upon oath, promised, affianced, pledged, bound, committed, compromised, in for it, as one's head shall answer for, in for a penny in for a pound, ex voto, gage d'amour.

Affirmation

N affirmance, affirmation, statement, allegation, assertion, predication, declaration, word, averment, confirmation, asseveration, adjuration, swearing, oath, affidavit, deposition, avouchment, assurance, protest, protestation, profession, acknowledgment, legal pledge, pronouncement, solemn averment, solemn avowal, solemn declaration, remark, observation, position, saying, dictum, sentence, ipse dixit, emphasis, weight, dogmatism, dogmatics, asserting, declaratory, predicatory, pronunciative, affirmative, soi-disant, positive, certain, express, explicit, absolute, emphatic, flat, broad, round, pointed, marked, distinct, decided, confident, trenchant, dogmatic, definitive, formal, solemn, categorical, peremptory, unretracted, predicable, affirmatively, in the affirmative, with emphasis, ex-cathedra, without fear of contradiction, as God is my witness, I must say, indeed, i' faith, let me tell you, why, give me leave to say, marry, you may be sure, I'd have you to know, upon my word, upon my honor, by my troth, egad, I assure you, by jingo, by Jove, by George, troth, seriously, sadly, in sadness, in sober sadness, in truth, in earnest, of a truth, truly, perdy, in all conscience, upon oath, be assured, yes, I'll warrant, I'll warrant you, I'll engage, I'll answer for it, I'll be bound, I'll venture to say, I'll take my oath, in fact, forsooth, joking apart, so help me God, not to mince the matter, quoth he, dixi.

Untruth

N untruth, falsehood, lie, story, thing that is not, fib, bounce, crammer, taradiddle, whopper, jhuth, forgery, fabrication, invention, misstatement, misrepresentation, perversion, falsification, gloss, suggestio falsi, exaggeration, invention, fabrication, fiction, fable, nursery tale, romance, absurd story, untrue story, false story, trumped up story, trumped up statement, thing devised by the enemy, canard, shave, sell, hum, traveler's tale, Canterbury tale, cock and bull story, fairy tale, fake, claptrap, press agent's yarn, puff, puffery (exaggeration), myth, moonshine, bosh, all my eye and Betty Martin, mare's nest, farce, irony, half truth, white lie, pious fraud, mental reservation, pretense, pretext, false plea, subterfuge, evasion, shift, shuffle, make-believe, sham, profession, empty words, Judas kiss, disguise, untrue, false, phony, trumped up, void of foundation, without- foundation, fictive, far from the truth, false as dicer's oaths, unfounded, ben trovato, invented, fabulous, fabricated, forged, fictitious, factitious, supposititious, surreptitious, elusory, illusory, ironical, soi-disant, se non e vero e ben trovato, where none is meant that meets the ear.