Abbreviation
//əˌbɹiː.viˈeɪ.ʃən// noun
noun ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 The result of shortening or reducing; abridgment. countable, uncountable
- 2 shortening something by omitting parts of it wordnet
- 3 A shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase used to represent the whole, using omission of letters, and sometimes substitution of letters, or duplication of initial letters to signify plurality, including signs such as +, =, @. countable, uncountable
"Hants is an abbreviation of Hampshire."
- 4 a shortened form of a word or phrase wordnet
- 5 The process of abbreviating. countable, uncountable
Show 5 more definitions
- 6 A notation used in music score to denote a direction, as pp or mf. countable, uncountable
- 7 One or more dashes through the stem of a note, dividing it respectively into quavers, semiquavers, demisemiquavers, or hemidemisemiquavers. countable, uncountable
- 8 Any convenient short form used as a substitution for an understood or inferred whole. countable, uncountable
"The phrase "civil rights" is an abbreviation for a whole complex of relationships."
- 9 Loss during evolution of the final stages of the ancestral ontogenetic pattern. countable, uncountable
- 10 Reduction to lower terms, as a fraction. countable, uncountable
Example
More examples"We use DS as an abbreviation of 'dyad' style."
Etymology
First attested 1400–50. From Middle English abbreviacioun, from Middle French abreviation, from Ecclesiastical Latin abbreviātiō, from Latin ab + breviō (“shorten”), from brevis (“short”). By surface analysis, abbreviate + -ion.
Related phrases
More for "abbreviation"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.