property

pronunciation

How to pronounce property in British English: UK [ˈprɒpəti] word uk audio image

How to pronounce property in American English: US [ˈprɑːpərti] word us audio image

Noun:

any area set aside for a particular purpose
something owned; any tangible or intangible possession that is owned by someone
a basic or essential attribute shared by all members of a class
a construct whereby objects or individuals can be distinguished
any movable articles or objects used on the set of a play or movie

Word Origin

property: property: [13] Property and propriety [15] are doublets – that is to say, they have the same ancestor, but have diverged over the centuries. In this case the ancestor was Latin prōprietās ‘ownership’, a derivative of prōprius (from which English gets proper). It passed into Old French as propriete, which originally reached English via Anglo-Norman proprete as property, and was subsequently reborrowed direct from Old French as propriety (this to begin with denoted ‘property’, and did not begin to develop its present-day meaning until the 17th century). Proprietary [15] came from the late Latin derivative prōprietārius; and proprietor [17] was formed from proprietary by substituting the suffix -or for -ary.=> proper, proprietary, propriety

property (n.): c. 1300, properte, "nature, quality," later "possession, thing owned" (early 14c., a sense rare before 17c.), from an Anglo-French modification of Old French propriete "individuality, peculiarity; property" (12c., Modern French propreté; see propriety), from Latin proprietatem (nominative proprietas) "ownership, a property, propriety, quality," literally "special character" (a loan-translation of Greek idioma), noun of quality from proprius "one's own, special" (see proper). For "possessions, private property" Middle English sometimes used proper goods. Hot property "sensation, a success" is from 1947 in "Billboard" stories.