grandmastership

plural grandmasterships

1. countableuncountableThe factor of being a grandmaster; the status of a grandmaster, possessing notably superior mastery, experience and overall power, not merely physical and bodily and higher ranking.

   3 more examples

   At last the danger became so imminent that it could be no longer concealed. Ferdinand received the intimation with a decent fortitude; and touched perhaps with compunction at the imjustice which he had done his grandson, or influenced by the honest remonstrances of Carvajal, Zapara, and Vargas, his most ancient and faithful counsellors, who represented to him, that by investing Prince Ferdinand with the regency he would infallibly entail a civil war on the two brothers, and by bestowing on him the grandmastership of the mulitary orders, would stmp the crown of its noblest ornament and chief strength, he consented to alter his will with respect to both these particulars[.]^([sic])

   1818, William Robertson, History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles, pages 25-26

   Chan Wah Soon was a money changer with a shop next door to Leung Jun;s He was a large, strong man, who admired his Wing Chun ability. When Leung Jun chose to keep his art within his family and not take any outside students, Chan Wah Soon resorted to spying on Leung Jun's daily teachings to his sons. Leung Jun soon learned of Chan's spying and deliberately taught a modified version when Chan was watching. Chan's dedication to spying eventually touched Leung Jun and he was eventually accepted as a disciple. However, Leung Jun continued to teach only the modified version to change because he feared that after his own death, Chan would dispute the Wing Chun grandmastership with his sons. Since chance was a much larger and stronger man, neither of Leung Jun's sons could have defeated him if Chan had leared the real version of Wing Chun.

   1983, William Cheung, Wing Chun Bil Lee, the Deadly Art of Thrusting Fingers, Unique Publications, →ISBN, pages 12-13

   To a grandmaster: a draw may only be offered by an untitled player to a grandmaster from a position of tangible superiority. The correct phrasing to adopt on such an occasion is: ‘Your grandmastership, might I be so bold at this juncture of the contest to beg to suggest in all humility, the halving of the point?’

   1995, William Roland Hartston, Soft Pawn, Cadogan, →ISBN, page 42