What is "fidelity"

Fidelity \Fi*del"i*ty\, n. [L. fidelitas: cf. F. fid['e]lit['e]. See Fealty.] Faithfulness; adherence to right; careful and exact observance of duty, or discharge of obligations. Especially:

1. Adherence to a person or party to which one is bound; loyalty.

   Whose courageous fidelity was proof to all danger.
   --Macaulay.

   The best security for the fidelity of men is to make interest coincide with duty.
   --A. Hamilton.

2. Adherence to the marriage contract.

3. Adherence to truth; veracity; honesty.

   The principal thing required in a witness is fidelity.
   --Hooker.

   Syn: Faithfulness; honesty; integrity; faith; loyalty; fealty.

early 15c., "faithfulness, devotion," from Middle French fidélité (15c.), from Latin fidelitatem (nominative fidelitas) "faithfulness, adherence, trustiness," from fidelis "faithful, true, trusty, sincere," from fides "faith" (see faith). From 1530s as "faithful adherence to truth or reality;" specifically of sound reproduction from 1878.

n. 1 faithfulness to one's duties. 2 loyalty to one's spouse or partner, including abstention from extramarital affairs (except in an open marriage). 3 accuracy, or exact correspondence to some given quality or fact. 4 The degree to which a system accurately reproduces an input.

1. n. accuracy with which an electronic system reproduces the sound or image of its input signal

2. the quality of being faithful [syn: faithfulness] [ant: infidelity, infidelity]

Fidelity is the quality of faithfulness or loyalty. Its original meaning regarded duty in a broader sense than the related concept of fealty. Both derive from the Latin word fidēlis, meaning "faithful or loyal". In the City of London financial markets it has traditionally been used in the sense encompassed in the motto "My word is my bond".

Fidelity, now defunct, was an organization within the Anglican Church of Canada committed to retaining traditional understanding of human sexuality within that church. It was opposed to, but in dialogue with, Integrity Canada.

Fidelity is the quality of being faithful or loyal.

Fidelity may also refer to:

"Fidelity" is a song by American singer-songwriter Regina Spektor, released as the second single from her fourth album Begin to Hope. The song marked Spektor's first Billboard 100 entry and is her most successful track to date. Despite a release date of September 25 (its popular music video was released even earlier), the song did not hit the charts until December. The song was released in the UK as a two-part single on March 12, 2007. The song making it Spektor's highest-charting single across the world.

Spektor wrote the song while watching the movie High Fidelity, which is based on a book by Nick Hornby.

In 2009, the song was used with permission as accompaniment to the video, "Don't divorce us", released by the Courage Campaign against Proposition 8. The video was viewed over 500,000 times in a week. The single was certified gold by the RIAA for sales of 500,000 copies. and single released from her album Begin to Hope which was her most successful single in United States.

The song was also used in Veronica Mars, Brothers & Sisters, A Favorita, Grey's Anatomy, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, 27 Dresses, Love & Other Drugs.

Fidelity is a 2000 French drama film written and directed by Andrzej Żuławski and starring Sophie Marceau, Pascal Greggory, and Guillaume Canet. Based on Madame de La Fayette's seventeenth century novel La Princesse de Clèves, the film is about a talented photographer who lands a lucrative job in Paris with a scandal-mongering tabloid and becomes romantically involved with an eccentric children's book publisher while resisting the sexual advances of another photographer. Filmed on location in Paris, Fidelity received the Cabourg Romantic Film Festival Award for Best Actress (Sophie Marceau) and the Golden Swann Award (Andrzej Zulawski).

Fidelity when personified in Western art stands for the secular aspect of Faith, or the trust that exists between a master and servant, or in family relationships. Fidelity is often represented as a woman, shown holding a golden seal and a key, but may also be represented by a dog. Fidelity may be shown alone, or may be accompanied by a dog, a symbol of not only faithfulness but also fidelity. In the Renaissance, Penelope or Griselda might also stand for fidelity. Fidelity is not in the usual lists of the seven virtues, though it may sometimes be included in such groupings. The plant myrtle ( Myrtus) has been associated with fidelity, and hence used in weddings, from Roman times to the present, and wreathed crowns of myrtle may be found in art.