Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The act or process of diminishing; a lessening or reduction.
- noun The resulting reduction; decrease.
- noun Music Statement of a theme in notes of lesser duration, usually one-half, of the original.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The act of diminishing, lessening, or reducing; a making smaller; a lowering in amount, value, dignity, estimation, etc.: as, the diminution of wealth, of importance, of power.
- noun The process of becoming less: as, the apparent diminution of a receding body; the diminution of the velocity of a projectile.
- noun In music, the repetition or imitation of a subject or theme in notes having one half or one quarter the duration of those first used: a favorite device in contrapuntal composition. See canon, counterpoint, and imitation.
- noun In law, an omission in the record of a case sent up from an inferior court to the court of review.
- noun In heraldry, differencing, especially that kind of differencing called
cadency . - noun In architecture, the gradual decrease in the diameter of the shaft of a column from the base to the capital.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The act of diminishing, or of making or becoming less; state of being diminished; reduction in size, quantity, or degree; -- opposed to
augmentation orincrease . - noun The act of lessening dignity or consideration, or the state of being deprived of dignity; a lowering in estimation; degradation; abasement.
- noun (Law) Omission, inaccuracy, or defect in a record.
- noun (Mus.) In counterpoint, the imitation of, or reply to, a subject, in notes of half the length or value of those the subject itself.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A
lessening ,decrease orreduction . - noun music The
shortening of thenotes of amelody ortheme .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the act of decreasing or reducing something
- noun change toward something smaller or lower
- noun the statement of a theme in notes of lesser duration (usually half the length of the original)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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I. iii.18 (165,3) till the diminution/Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle] _The diminution of space_, is _the diminution_ of which
Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies Samuel Johnson 1746
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If the above seems to create an "unfair" windfall for stockholders or short term diminution of tax revenues, raise the capital gains rates.
Al Checchi: Government's Travels Al Checchi 2011
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I learned augmentation and diminution from the d-sharp-minor fugue in Book I of the WTC; I learned inversion from Rachmaninoff's Paganini Variations — the old stand-bys are old indeed.
Archive 2008-02-01 Matthew Guerrieri 2008
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I learned augmentation and diminution from the d-sharp-minor fugue in Book I of the WTC; I learned inversion from Rachmaninoff's Paganini Variations — the old stand-bys are old indeed.
Spark plugs and transmissions Matthew Guerrieri 2008
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But that diminution is contained within the House of Representatives itself whose members all suffer equally.
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But that diminution is contained within the House of Representatives itself whose members all suffer equally.
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After the summer solstice, although the days are shortening in consequence of the sun's recession, their diminution is for some time scarcely perceptible, and as the days are still much longer than the nights, more heat is imparted to the earth than is lost by night-radiation.
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I had thought it was just either some short-term diminution in frequency that might be over soon, or a case of the recency illusion.
Pharyngula 2010
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Someone will no-doubt pop up and say that evolution will ensure that new, adapted species will pop up, but the current evidence suggests that the change will be faster than evolution will be able to comfortably adapt for leading to a long term diminution in biological richness.
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"Given the uncertainties in both models and the significant differences concerning the causes (dust and soot, versus sulphates) and length (three months to several years), the analogy between 'nuclear winter' and 'volcanic winter' was unsubstantiated, having only a vague commonality in a short-term diminution of global temperatures.
James Warren: This Week in Magazines: Online Dating, Erupting Volcanoes and Dick Cheney 2009
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