CONSIGNMENT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does consignment mean? 

• CONSIGNMENT (noun)
  The noun CONSIGNMENT has 3 senses:

1. goods carried by a large vehicle

2. the official act of consigning a person to confinement (as in a prison or mental hospital)

3. the delivery of goods for sale or disposal

  Familiarity information: CONSIGNMENT used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CONSIGNMENT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Goods carried by a large vehicle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

cargo; consignment; freight; lading; load; loading; payload; shipment

Hypernyms ("consignment" is a kind of...):

merchandise; product; ware (commodities offered for sale)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The official act of consigning a person to confinement (as in a prison or mental hospital)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

commitment; committal; consignment

Hypernyms ("consignment" is a kind of...):

confinement (the act of restraining of a person's liberty by confining them)

Derivation:

consign (commit forever; commit irrevocably)

Sense 3

Meaning:

The delivery of goods for sale or disposal

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("consignment" is a kind of...):

bringing; delivery (the act of delivering or distributing something (as goods or mail))

Derivation:

consign (send to an address)

 Context examples 

They all knew that I was busy, and that my stay was short, and Mr. Billington had ready in his office all the papers concerning the consignment of boxes.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

“‘Answers to the name of Buck,’” the man soliloquized, quoting from the saloon-keeper’s letter which had announced the consignment of the crate and contents.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

He had received a consignment of books upon philology and was settling down to develop this thesis when suddenly, to my sorrow and to his unfeigned delight, we found ourselves, even in that land of dreams, plunged into a problem at our very doors which was more intense, more engrossing, and infinitely more mysterious than any of those which had driven us from London.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

You will please deposit the boxes, fifty in number, which form the consignment, in the partially ruined building forming part of the house and marked 'A' on rough diagram enclosed.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Good! he said, and then went on to ask about the means of making consignments and the forms to be gone through, and of all sorts of difficulties which might arise, but by forethought could be guarded against.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)