Middle English: from Anglo-Norman French victorie, from Latin victoria.

• A medieval word that goes back to Latin victoria ‘victory’. The ultimate root was Latin vincere ‘to conquer’, also the source of convince (mid 16th century), convict (Late Middle English), evict (early 16th century), and vanquish (Middle English). Dig for Victory was a British slogan of the Second World War which urged people to grow their own food to make up for the loss of imports. A Pyrrhic victory is a victory won at too great a cost. It comes from Pyrrhus, a king of Epirus, part of present-day Greece. Pyrrhus invaded Italy in 280 bc and defeated the Romans at the battle of Asculum, though only after such heavy losses that after the battle he is said to have exclaimed: ‘One more such victory and we are lost.’ Queen Victoria, whose name is the Latin for ‘victory’, and whose long reign lasted from 1837 to 1901, gave her name to the Victorian era. A support for Victorian values, often summed up as hard work, social responsibility, and strict morality, is associated with former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who said in 1983: ‘I was asked whether I was trying to restore Victorian values. I said straight out I was. And I am.’