portion
An allocated amount.
Noun
- An allocated amount.
- That which is divided off or separated, as a part from a whole; a separated part of anything.
Synonyms: part piece bit chip chunk clip crumb crumbling cutting flake fleak fragment hunk lump mammock ort piecemeal portion scrap scraplet slice snead snippet steck
- One's fate; lot.
- The Lord of that ſeruant […] will appoint him his portion with the vnbeleeuers. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Luke 12:46, columns 2–1:
- Man's portion is to die and rise again. - 1827, [John Keble], The Christian Year: Thoughts in Verse for the Sundays and Holydays throughout the Year, volume (please specify |volume=I or II), Oxford, Oxfordshire: […]...
- "Everywhere the same!" exclaimed Francesca, as she resumed her seat—"the same human misery—the same human portion!... - 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London:...
Synonyms: doom fortune chance destin destiny fatality fate foredoom foreordination kismet lot orlay portion predestination predestiny preordination qadar weird wyrd
- The part of an estate given or falling to a child or heir; an inheritance.
- Father, giue me the portion of goods that falleth to me. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Luke 15:12, column 1:
- O! yearning heart! I did inherit Thy withering portion with the fame, The searing glory which hath shone Amid the jewels of my throne, Halo of Hell! - 1829, Edgar Allan Poe, “Tamerlane”, in Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and...
- A wife's fortune; a dowry.
- Commend me to her, and to piece her portion / Tender her this. - 1613–1614 (date written), John Fletcher, William Shak[e]speare, The Two Noble Kinsmen: […], London: […] Tho[mas] Cotes, for Iohn Waterson; […], published...
- I took part of a small house in the Old Jewry; and being advised to alter my condition, I married Mrs. Mary Burton, second daughter to Mr. Edmund Burton, hosier, in Newgate-street, with whom I received four hundred...
Origin
Etymology tree Latin portiōder. Old French porcionbor. Middle English porcioun English portion From Middle English porcioun, borrowed from Old French porcion, accusative of Latin portiōnem (“a share, part, portion, relation, proportion”), from portiō, akin to pars (“part”); see part. Compare proportion.
Forms
Related
Derived
handbasket portion marriage-portion midportion multiportion outportion portion control portionist portionless portionwise preportion reportion scrimption subportion test portion underportion
Verb
- To divide into amounts, as for allocation to specific purposes.
- To endow with a portion or inheritance.
- Him portioned maids, apprenticed orphans, blest. - 1733, Alexander Pope, Epistle to Bathurst: