emporium
pronunciation
How to pronounce emporium in British English:
UK [emˈpɔ:riəm]
How to pronounce emporium in American English:
US [ɛmˈpɔriəm, -ˈpor-]
-
- Noun:
- a large retail store organized into departments offering a variety of merchandise; commonly part of a retail chain
Word Origin
- emporium (n.)
- 1580s, "place of trade, mart," from Latin emporium, from Greek emporion "trading place, market," from emporos "merchant," originally "traveler," from assimilated form of en "in" (see en- (2)) + poros "passage, voyage," related to peirein "to pass through" (see port (n.1)). Greek emporos in the "merchant" sense meant especially "one who trades on a large scale, usually but not necessarily by sea" [Buck], as opposed to kapelos "local retail dealer, shopkeeper." Properly, a town which serves as the commercial hub of a region, but by 1830s American English "Grandiloquently applied to a shop or store" [Craigie].
Example
- 1. Yet within just four years the international emporium had collapsed , with catastrophic losses .
- 2. The financial marketplace , meanwhile , has become a dizzying emporium of choice and easy credit .
- 3. Yet amazon still retains one big advantage : its vast online book emporium .
- 4. He took me to a broom-cupboard-sized emporium in an alley .
- 5. Essentially , ok cupid opened a parlor-game emporium and then got down to the business of pairing off the patrons .