consumption

Pronunciation

• IPA: /kənˈsʌmp.ʃən/^[1]

Etymology

It is Middle English consumpcioun, probably borrowed from Old French consumpcion and directly borrowed from Latin cōnsūmptiō (“a using up, wasting”),^[2][3][4] from the past participle stem of cōnsūmere (“to use up, eat, waste”) (see consume),^[2][3] from com-, probably intensive, and sūmere (“to take”),^[2] from sub- and emere “to buy, take”, from PIE Proto-Indo-European *em- (“to take”).^[2] The p of the Latin forms was inserted where m stood before a t.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The wasting of the body by disease: 1398 in the OED, before 1398 in Barnhart, in Trevisa's translation of Bartholomew.^[5][3] It replaced Old English yfeladl “the evil disease”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Specifically pulmonary consumption, tuberculosis, is from the 1650s.^[3][5] Destruction in general is from 1563–87, and decay or wasting away from 1513.^[5] The using up of material, or eating, is from before 1535, in Sir Thomas More,^[3][5] and in economics, as opposed to production, from 1662.^[3] The amount consumed, as in fuel consumption, is a modern sense.^[6][7] Consumptive is from before 1398 as a noun and before 1425 as an adjective.^[3]

Timeline

• 1398 – a wasting disease.^[5]
• 1513 – decay.^[5]
• a1535 – using up of material.^[5][3]
• 1650s – tuberculosis.^[3]
• 1662 – in economics.^[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. The using up of something, such as food, energy or goods.
2. The amount used: fuel consumption.
3. (economics) Spending on goods and services.
4. (dated) Tuberculosis of the lungs.

Word family

• nonconsumption
• overconsumption
• self-consumption
• underconsumption
• conspicuous consumption

Related words

• consumer
• consume
• consumptive
• assume
• presume
• resume

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
7. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins