treaty

Meaning

1. A formal binding agreement concluded by subjects of international law, namely, states and international organizations; a convention, a pact.
2. Chiefly in in treaty: discussions or negotiations in order to reach an agreement.
3. Chiefly in private treaty: an agreement or settlement reached following negotiations; a compact, a contract, a covenant.
4. (obsolete) The manner or process of treating someone or something; treatment; also, the manner in which someone or something acts or behaves; behaviour.
5. (obsolete) The addressing or consideration of a subject; discussion, treatment.
6. (obsolete) A formal, systematic discourse on some subject; a treatise.
7. (obsolete) An act of beseeeching or entreating; an entreaty, a plea, a request.

Frequency

Hyphenated as

trea‧ty

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈtɹiːti/

The noun is derived from Middle English trete, trety (“bargaining, negotiation; discussion; conference, meeting; entreaty, persuasion; agreement, contract, covenant; arrangement, settlement; agreement between two rulers, states, etc.; written work on a particular subject, treatise; subdivision of a written work, section”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman treté, traité, treaté, and Old French traité, traitié [and other forms] (modern French traité (“agreement between two rulers, states, etc.; treatise”)); traité or traitié is: * a noun use of the past participle of traiter (“to treat; to deal with, handle”), from Latin tractāre, the present active infinitive of tractō (“to drag, haul, tug; to handle, manage; to debate, discuss; to exercise, practise; to perform, transact”), from trahō (“to drag, pull”) (probably ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *tregʰ- (“to drag, pull (?)”), a variant of *dʰregʰ- (“to drag, pull; to run”)) + -tō (frequentative suffix); and * also from Latin tractātum (“written work on a particular subject, treatise”), from Latin tractātus (“dragged, hauled, tugged; handled, managed; exercised, practised; performed, transacted”), the perfect passive participle of tractō (see above). The verb is derived from the noun.