Search Result for "visitation": 
Wordnet 3.0

NOUN (3)

1. an annoying or frustrating or catastrophic event;
- Example: "his mother-in-law's visits were a great trial for him"
- Example: "life is full of tribulations"
- Example: "a visitation of the plague"
[syn: trial, tribulation, visitation]

2. any disaster or catastrophe;
- Example: "a visitation of the plague"

3. an official visit for inspection or supervision;
- Example: "the commissioner made visitations to all the precinct stations"
- Example: "the recent visitation of the bishop to his diocese"


The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Visitation \Vis`it*a"tion\, n. [L. visitatio: cf. F. visitation.] 1. The act of visiting, or the state of being visited; access for inspection or examination. [1913 Webster] Nothing but peace and gentle visitation. --Shak. [1913 Webster] 2. Specifically: The act of a superior or superintending officer who, in the discharge of his office, visits a corporation, college, etc., to examine into the manner in which it is conducted, and see that its laws and regulations are duly observed and executed; as, the visitation of a diocese by a bishop. [1913 Webster] 3. The object of a visit. [Obs.] "O flowers, . . . my early visitation and my last." --Milton. [1913 Webster] 4. (Internat. Law) The act of a naval commander who visits, or enters on board, a vessel belonging to another nation, for the purpose of ascertaining her character and object, but without claiming or exercising a right of searching the vessel. It is, however, usually coupled with the right of search (see under Search), visitation being used for the purpose of search. [1913 Webster] 5. Special dispensation; communication of divine favor and goodness, or, more usually, of divine wrath and vengeance; retributive calamity; retribution; judgment. [1913 Webster] What will ye do in the day of visitation? --Isa. x. 3. [1913 Webster] 6. (Eccl.) A festival in honor of the visit of the Virgin Mary to Elisabeth, mother of John the Baptist, celebrated on the second of July. [1913 Webster] The Order of the Visitation of Our Lady (R. C. Ch.), a religious community of nuns, founded at Annecy, in Savoy, in 1610, and in 1808 established in the United States. In America these nuns are devoted to the education of girls. [1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

visitation n 1: an annoying or frustrating or catastrophic event; "his mother-in-law's visits were a great trial for him"; "life is full of tribulations"; "a visitation of the plague" [syn: trial, tribulation, visitation] 2: any disaster or catastrophe; "a visitation of the plague" 3: an official visit for inspection or supervision; "the commissioner made visitations to all the precinct stations"; "the recent visitation of the bishop to his diocese"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:

138 Moby Thesaurus words for "visitation": Jacksonian epilepsy, Rolandic epilepsy, abdominal epilepsy, access, acquired epilepsy, activated epilepsy, affect epilepsy, affliction, akinetic epilepsy, apoplexy, arrest, attack, autonomic epilepsy, bane, blight, blockage, bugbear, burden, calamity, call, calling, calvary, cardiac epilepsy, cataclysm, catastrophe, clonic spasm, clonus, convulsion, cortical epilepsy, cramp, cross, crucible, crushing burden, curse, cursive epilepsy, death, destruction, disaster, disease, diurnal epilepsy, duty visit, eclampsia, epilepsia, epilepsia gravior, epilepsia major, epilepsia minor, epilepsia mitior, epilepsia nutans, epilepsia tarda, epilepsy, evil, examination, falling sickness, fit, focal epilepsy, formal visit, frenzy, grand mal, grievance, harm, haute mal, hysterical epilepsy, ictus, infliction, inspection, larval epilepsy, laryngeal epilepsy, laryngospasm, latent epilepsy, lockjaw, mad round, matutinal epilepsy, menstrual epilepsy, mischance, musicogenic epilepsy, myoclonous epilepsy, nemesis, nocturnal epilepsy, occlusion, open wound, ordeal, overhaul, overhauling, paroxysm, perlustration, perusal, pest, pestilence, petit mal, physiologic epilepsy, plague, psychic epilepsy, psychomotor epilepsy, punishment, quality control, reflex epilepsy, required visit, review, rotatoria, run-through, running sore, scan, scourge, scrutiny, seizure, sensory epilepsy, serial epilepsy, social call, social round, social whirl, sojourning, spasm, staying, stoppage, stroke, study, survey, tardy epilepsy, tetanus, tetany, thorn, throes, thromboembolism, thrombosis, tonic epilepsy, tonic spasm, torment, torsion spasm, tragedy, traumatic epilepsy, trial, tribulation, trismus, ucinate epilepsy, vexation, visit, visiting, woe
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856):

VISITATION. The act of examining into the affairs of a corporation. 2. The power of visitation is applicable only to ecclesiastical and eleemosynary corporations. 1 Bl. Com. 480; 2 Kid on Corp. 174. The visitation of civil corporations is by the government itself, through the medium of the courts of justice Vide 2 Kent, Com. 240.