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Prowess is great skill at doing something — so good that people notice. Long ago it meant bravery in battle, and you can still feel that proud, impressive flavour. Today writers like it for sport, war, or any craft: athletic prowess, military prowess, her prowess at the piano. It is not a word most people drop into casual chat; it belongs more to news, essays, and praise. It is about ability, not about creeping, and not about the front of a ship. It is also not simply “being proud,” even though proud is a historical cousin.
高超本領；卓越實力
組成From Old French proesce / proece, “bravery, excellence,” from preu / prou, “good, brave, excellent.” Same old family as English proud.
同家族的字
- proudsame Old French family: prou meant good, brave, excellent
原始詞典資料4 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
prowessnoun/ˈpɹaʊɪs/
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Skillfulness or extraordinary ability in a particular area of expertise; dexterity, mastery, or proficiency.
- When in liquor he would make foolish wagers. On one of these too frequent occasions he was boasting of his prowess as a pedestrian and athlete, and the outcome was a match against nature. For a stake of one sovereign he undertook to run all the way to Coventry and back, a distance of something more than forty miles.
- There is such a sense of inferiority sometimes when it comes to facing Germany, with all their World Cups, their penalty prowess and easy sophistication, it might come as a surprise to learn that, in head-to-head encounters, England actually match their opponents.
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Distinguished bravery or courage, especially in battle; heroism.
- That libertie Poets of late in their invectives have exceeded: they have borne their ſword up where it is not lawfull for a poynado, that is but the page of proweſſe, to intermeddle.
- […] But, wroth because this man in full assembly, / Came and reviled thee, thou wouldst shew thy prowess, / The prowess that attends thee, that henceforth / Not e'er a man might think to scorn thy prowess, […]
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An act of prowess.
- I recollect hearing […] of his [Sir William Hamilton's] simple, independent, meditative habits, ruggedly athletic modes of exercise, fondness for his big dog, etc. etc.: […] I did not witness, much less share in, any of the swimming or other athletic prowesses.
- As the Middle Ages drew to a close and the Renaissance rose like a new sun, knowledge of philosophy and the sciences became objects of interest to a nobility that had once held only skill in battle as a prowess worth attaining.
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An act of prowess.
- Thenne the batails approuched and ſhoue and ſhowted on bothe ſydes / many men ouerthrowen / hurte / & ſlayn and grete valyaunces / proweſſes and appertyces of werre were that day ſhewed […]
- If it is deemed of so much importance, why has no attention been paid to the effects of general friendship, such as certain military prowesses, in which you see a portion of a regiment sacrifice itself in support of another portion?
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。