abbreviation

See also: Abbreviation
For abbreviations in Wiktionary, see Category:Abbreviations by language

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

First attested 1400–50. From Middle English abbreviacioun, from Middle French abreviation, from Late Latin abbreviātiō, from Latin ad + breviō (“shorten”), from brevis (“short”).

Pronunciation

Noun

abbreviation (countable and uncountable, plural abbreviations)

  1. The result of shortening or reducing; abridgment. [First attested around 1350 to 1470.][1]
  2. (linguistics) A shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase, used to represent the whole, utilizing omission of letters, and sometimes substitution of letters, or duplication of initial letters to signify plurality, including signs such as +, =, @. [Late 16th century.][1]
  3. The process of abbreviating. [Mid 16th century.][1]
  4. (music) A notation used in music score to denote a direction, as pp or mf.
  5. (music) One or more dashes through the stem of a note, dividing it respectively into quavers, semiquavers, demisemiquavers, or hemidemisemiquavers.
  6. Any convenient short form used as a substitution for an understood or inferred whole.
    • President Truman's committee on Civil Rights
      The phrase "civil rights" is an abbreviation for a whole complex of relationships.
  7. (biology) Loss during evolution of the final stages of the ancestral ontogenetic pattern.
  8. (mathematics) Reduction to lower terms, as a fraction.

Synonyms

abbreviature; abridgement; abstract; compend; compression; condensation; contraction; curtailment; epitome; reduction; shortcut; summary

Antonyms

amplification; dilation; enlargement; expansion; expatiation; extension; production

Hyponyms
  • (linguistics): acronym (employing initial letters or syllables); initialism (employing initial letters); symbol, sign (employing marks other than letters)

Translations
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
Translations to be checked

References
  1. “abbreviation” in Lesley Brown, editor, The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 5th edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 3.
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