Also 6–7 -virat, 7 -verat, erron. triumpherate. [ad. L. triumvirāt-us, f. triumvir, TRIUMVIR: see -ATE1.]
1. Rom. Hist. The position, office, or function of the triumviri, or of a triumvir; an association of three magistrates for joint administration: see TRIUMVIR.
1601. Holland, Pliny, XXXV. xi. II. 546. A pretie jest … reported … as touching Lepidus: It happened during the time of his Triumvirat.
1606. Shaks., Ant. & Cl., III. vi. 28. He frets That Lepidus of the Triumpherate, should be depos’d.
1718. Rowe, trans. Lucan, I. 182. The fierce Triumvirate combin’d in peace.
1841. W. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., I. 89. Cæsar’s … weaker rivals…, Antony and Lepidus, who had formed with him the Second Triumvirate.
2. By extension: Any association of three joint rulers or powers.
1584. Leycesters Commw. (1641), 86*. What doe you thinke … of this new Triumvirat so lately concluded about Arbella?
c. 1650. Denham, On Fletcher’s Wks., 30. When Jonson, Shakespear, and thyself,… swayed in the triumvirate of wit.
1741–2. H. Walpole, Lett. to Mann (1834), I. 64. A triumvirate who hate one another more than any body they could proscribe.
1861. Sat. Rev., 23 Nov., 526. He wishes Germany to be ruled by a triumvirate of Ministers.
fig. 1643. Sir T. Browne, Relig. Med., I. § 19. There is in our Soul a kind of Triumvirate, or triple Government of three Competitors.
1649. Milton, Eikon., xxii. Wks. (1847), 323/2. That violent and lawless triumvirate within him, under the falsified names of his reason, honour, and conscience.
1898. C. Martyn, in Voice (N.Y.), 9 June, 6/4. The third member in his triumvirate of powers was a robust conscience.
3. Less exactly, A group or set of three persons (rarely things) thought of together, but not necessarily associated in fact; a trio; esp. three persons of authority or distinction in any sphere.
1654. H. L’Estrange, Chas. I. (1655), 145. June the 14. a Triumvirate of Libellers, Mr. Prin,… Dr. Bastwick,… and Mr. Burton … received a severe censure in the Star-chamber.
1748. Richardson, Clarissa, Wks. 1883, VIII. 197. How I cursed the censoriousness of this plaguy triumvirate! A parson, a milliner, and a mantua-maker!
1873. Lowell, Among my Bks., Ser. II. 2. The great triumvirate of Italian poetry, good sense, and culture.
1898. W. Graham, Last Links, 117. And it was on this shrine that one of the triumvirate of the young century [Byron, Shelley, Keats]—one whose name will only die when the memory of English poetry passes away, ‘like a tale that is told’—offered his love.
4. attrib. or as adj.
1586. T. B., La Primaud. Fr. Acad., I. 659. Brutus and Cassius … slew Cæsar: wherupon … the triumvirate war was opened against them.
1624. Capt. Smith, Virginia, V. 181. A petition … vnto the triumuerat Gouernors.
1849. Morning Chron., 3 Feb. A triumvirate leadership … Mr. Herries, Lord Granby, and Mr. Disraeli.
