Talk:ally

The first or second syllable can be stressed in "ally"

I believe "Allied" (WWII) has stress on the first syllable but "allies" has stress on the second syllable, or maybe the first also.
 * You mean as a verb? I think first-syllable emphasis is common U.S. pronunciation, second-syllable is common British. It's also a difference between noun (first syllable) and verb (second). --Mksmith 14:37, 14 May 2007 (UTC)


 * In my experience the noun "ally" has initial stress and the verb "to ally" has final stress (as in so many other noun-verb pairs). "Allied" as an actual verb form ("they have allied themselves") is the same, but as an adjective ("allied forces") it tends to have initial stress. I think this usage is predominant, but one may of course hear either form in either context. I don't know if there's much of a US vs. Britain difference, but maybe so. 92.218.236.54 15:29, 23 July 2022 (UTC)

The word and its derivatives used to be used in biology to mean basically "taxonomically related", in phrases like "allied species", "ducks and their allies", etc. --128.114.59.172 05:12, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Transitive?
I only came here because this is on the main page. We are saying that ally (v) can be transitive or intransitive? Really? I have never seen A allied B. Only A and B allied, A allied with B or A allied to B, all of which are using the the verb as intransitive.

But maybe I am missing something. I don't edit Wiktionary much and it is on the main page. So I thought I should check here before I dive in.

Yaris678 (talk) 08:55, 14 June 2022 (UTC)


 * yes, according to sources such as the OED, there are both transitive and intransitive uses. It is a little bit hard to spot the transitive uses because the word is often used passively. See the following quotations listed in the entry:
 * Spenser (1596): "These three ... were allyde" (passive construction).
 * Lightfoot (1634): "[H]e allieth that potent king to him".
 * Vickers (1861): "[S]he allieth herself at last to one of true worth".
 * — Sgconlaw (talk) 13:32, 14 June 2022 (UTC)