World War 1
12
3.0
- proper noun
- /wɜrld wɔr wʌn/
:
Primera Guerra Mundial
- Many nations were involved in World War I, which lasted from 1914 to 1918.
- World War 1 memorial
When you think about World War One, Germany was defeated.
- When you think about World War One, Germany was defeated.
- I mean, I really recommend people read World War One Warfare in detail.
- We load them up and we have a beautiful World War One trench storming system.
- You've mentioned World War One from the perspective of money.
- You know, I think there were still some World War One movies coming out.
- And yeah, yeah, I'm glad it's not World War One and I'm not serving in the trenches.
- I think his sexuality took a back seat because of World War One, which is fair enough.
- And they had these wonderful tracking shots through the World War One trenches.
- Iodine was added to salt starting back around World War One.
- Krabs was a very good soldier during World War One.
- And under hypnosis he discovered that this guy had been gassed during World War One at IP in Flanders.
- Stalin has no participation whatsoever in World War One.
- And yet World War One still occurs.
Examples
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When you think about World War One, Germany was defeated.
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Following World War I he became one of the leaders of the Weimar Republic and was one of the framers of its democratic constitution.
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What was World War One, and why does it matter?
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Now if you remember, World War One had just ended.
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How many people died in World War I?
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I was a captain in Battery D in World War I, and, well, that was the center of the whole war effort for me.
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And we'll see that the great pandemic after World War One had four major waves.
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The classical gold standard ended with the outbreak of World War I.
Academic text (2018) -
Hungary was the only nation, apart from Russia, to have a Communist government after World War I.
Academic text (2000) -
After World War I, events had moved rapidly as the Turkish Empire disintegrated.
Academic text (2018)
Synonyms
24
2.8
A large war in Europe from 1914 to 1918 between many countries, also called World War I
14
4.2
A war in Europe from 1914 to 1918 between the Allies and Central Powers
2
3.0
A large war that many countries fought from 1914 to 1918
Surface Forms
Morphology
The expression is compositionally built from 'world' (global) + 'war' (armed conflict) + 'one' (first), so a B1 learner who knows those constituents can infer it refers to the first global-scale war even without knowing specific dates or belligerents. The 'World War + ordinal' pattern is common cross-linguistically (e.g., Primera Guerra Mundial), which further supports immediate comprehensibility.
Etymology
World War 1 comes from a simple image: it was a war that pulled in many countries from around the world, and the number 1 shows it was the 'first' war on that scale. So today World War 1 means the big global conflict fought from 1914 to 1918.