lotterylot‧te‧ry /ˈlɒtəri $ ˈlɑː-/ ●○○ noun (plural lotteries) 
a lottery ticket Do you really think winning the lottery would make you happy?national/state lottery2[countable, uncountable] American English a system of deciding who will get something by choosing people’s names by chanceby lottery The State Department issues 55,000 visas each year by lottery.3 a lottery a situation in which what happens depends on chance and is not certain to be successful: That’s the trouble with capitalism. It’s a lottery.
WORD ORIGINlottery
Origin:
1500-1600 French loterie, from Middle Dutch, from lot ‘lot’EXAMPLES FROM OTHER DICTIONARIES
- A baby's sex is a genetic lottery. It all depends on the chromosomes the baby receives from its parents.
- the NFL draft lottery
- But it was a lottery and lotteries were undesirable.
- Franken also avoided military service with student deferments while at Harvard and, ultimately, a high lottery number.
- Nine hundred Maine residents and 100 nonresidents had their names drawn from a lottery.
- Similarly, if you have just won the lottery, go to an adviser who specialises in high net worth individuals.
- The organisers of the pools believe that huge jackpots are their best weapon in fighting the threat posed by a national lottery.
- They had been playing the lottery together for more than a year, and they trusted him.
- They have spent a lifetime playing the birth lottery.
- They will hate you with a loathing reserved for lottery winners.
WORD SETS
back, verbbank, nounbanker, nounbet, verbbet, nounbid, verbbingo, nounbookie, nounbookmaker, nouncasino, nounchip, nouncroupier, noundividend, noundraw, nouneach way, adverbfruit machine, noungamble, verbgaming, nounlottery, nounodds, nounofftrack, adjectiveone-armed bandit, nounparimutuel, nounplace, verbraffle, nounraffle, verbroulette, nounslot machine, nounstakeholder, nounsweepstake, nountombola, nountout, verbwager, nounwager, verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM THE ENTRY Do you really think winning the lottery would make you happy?COLLOCATIONS FROM THE CORPUSADJECTIVE
1[countable] a game used to make money for a state or a charity in which people buy tickets with a series of numbers on them. If their number is picked by chance, they win money or a prize: Do you really think winning the lottery would make you happy?· I agree with my hon. Friend about the usefulness of a national lottery.· Key elements of the new department will be the introduction of a national lottery and of a Millennium Fund.· To supply these funds he reestablished the national lottery which afforded the government about one hundred thousand duros a year.· The organisers of the pools believe that huge jackpots are their best weapon in fighting the threat posed by a national lottery.· A new national lottery to aid sport, the arts and the national heritage.· He will take over responsibility for broadcasting from the Home Office in addition to administering the new national lottery.
NOUN· Try your luck at the fairest, squarest state lottery of them all!· The state lottery, approved by voters 11 years ago, offers lotto and scratch-off tickets as close as the corner market.· Other measures gave us the state lottery, coastline protection, guaranteed levels of school finance and term limits.
· Informal sector activities include such occupations as street-vending of lottery tickets, food, combs, cigarettes and the inevitable chewing gum.· By comparison, lottery tickets can be bought as easily as chewing gum at hundreds of retail outlets and news agents.· Selling lottery tickets among your friends is one way; recruiting new members is another.· It was an unlikely gift, a winning lottery ticket that had dropped from the sky, and that was all.· There were blind men begging, selling lottery tickets.· As the cantor was reciting the Eighteen Benedictions, one fellow was trying to sell a lottery ticket.
a lottery ticket Do you really think winning the lottery would make you happy?national/state lottery2[countable, uncountable] American English a system of deciding who will get something by choosing people’s names by chanceby lottery The State Department issues 55,000 visas each year by lottery.3 a lottery a situation in which what happens depends on chance and is not certain to be successful: That’s the trouble with capitalism. It’s a lottery.