parcel
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: pärʹ-səl
ipa: /ˈpɑɹsəl/
ipa: [ˈpʰaː.səɫ]
ipa: [ˈpʰɑː.səɫ]
ipa: [ˈpʰɑɹ.səɫ]
rhymes: -ɑː(ɹ)səl
Forms: form: parcels
Etymology: From Middle English parcel, from Old French parcelle (“a small piece or part, a parcel, a particle”), from Late Latin particella, diminutive of Latin particula (“particle”), diminutive of partem (“part, piece”). Doublet of particle.
Senses: examples: text: I saw a brown paper parcel on my doorstep.
text: At twilight in the summer[…]the mice come out. They[…]eat the luncheon crumbs. Mr. Checkly, for instance, always brought his dinner in a paper parcel in his coat-tail pocket, and ate it when so disposed, sprinkling crumbs lavishly[…]on the floor.
ref: 1892, Walter Besant, chapter II, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:
text: “H'm !” he said, “so, so—it is a tragedy in a prologue and three acts. I am going down this afternoon to see the curtain fall for the third time on what […] will prove a good burlesque ; but it all began dramatically enough. It was last Saturday […] that two boys, playing in the little spinney just outside Wembley Park Station, came across three large parcels done up in American cloth. […]”
ref: 1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], “The Lisson Grove Mystery”, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC; republished as popular edition, London: Greening & Co., 1909, OCLC 11192831, quoted in The Case of Miss Elliott (ebook no. 2000141h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg of Australia, February 2020:
synonyms: package
glosses: A package wrapped for shipment.
glosses: An individual consignment of cargo for shipment, regardless of size and form.
glosses: An individual item appearing on an invoice or receipt (only in the phrase bill of parcels).
examples: text: I own a small parcel of land between the refinery and the fish cannery.
synonyms: plot
glosses: A division of land bought and sold as a unit.
glosses: A group of birds.
examples: text: […] this youthful parcel / Of noble bachelors stand at my bestowing,
ref: c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]:
text: […] instead of sitting (as she ought to have done) by her good father and mother, she must needs run up into the gallery, and sit with a parcel of giddy creatures of her own age […]
ref: 1847 March 30, Herman Melville, chapter 2, in Omoo: A Narrative of Adventures in the South Seas; […], London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 79:
glosses: An indiscriminate or indefinite number, measure, or quantity; a collection; a group.
glosses: A small amount of food that has been wrapped up, for example a pastry.
examples: text: A certain piece of land is part and parcel of another piece.
text: The same Experiments succeed on two Parcels of the White of an Egg […]
ref: 1731, John Arbuthnot, chapter 4, in An essay concerning the nature of aliments, London: J. Tonson, page 85:
text: 1881, John Addington Symonds, The Renaissance in Italy, Volume 5, Part I, New York: Henry Holt, Chapter 1, p. 2,
The parcels of the nation adopted different forms of self-government, sought divers foreign alliances.
text: I don't think we are sitting pretty / So far away from our fair city / But I love you more than any parcel of earth.
ref: 1982 April 3, “Mousie Mousie Wildflower”, in Gay Community News, page 15:
glosses: A portion of anything taken separately; a fragment of a whole; a part.
Derived terms: air parcel
bill of parcels
interparcel
multiparcel
parcel bomb
parcelcopter
parcelful
parcel gilt
parcellate
parcellation
parcel locker
parcel out
parcel-poet
parcel post
parcel shelf
parcel tape
parcel together
parcel up
parcelwise
part and parcel
pass the parcel
unparcel
Related terms: part
particle
particular
particulate
lot
allotment