capital
English edit
Alternative forms edit
Pronunciation edit
Etymology 1 edit
From Middle English capital, borrowed partly from Old French capital and partly from Latin capitālis (“of the head”)[1][2] (in sense “head of cattle”), from caput (“head”) (English cap) + -ālis (suffix forming adjectives). Use in trade and finance originated in Medieval economies when a common but expensive transaction involved trading heads of cattle. The noun is from the adjective.[3]
Compare chattel and kith and kine (“all one’s possessions”), which also use “cow” to mean “property”.
Doublet of cattle and chattel.
Noun edit
capital (countable and uncountable, plural capitals)
- (uncountable, economics) Already-produced durable goods available for use as a factor of production, such as steam shovels (equipment) and office buildings (structures).
- (uncountable, business, finance, insurance) Money and wealth. The means to acquire goods and services, especially in a non-barter system.
- He does not have enough capital to start a business.
- (countable) A city designated as a legislative seat by the government or some other authority, often the city in which the government is located; otherwise the most important city within a country or a subdivision of it.
- 1995, Linda Fang, The Chʻi-lin Purse: A Collection of Ancient Chinese Stories[1], New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 54:
- Lin Hsiang-ju immediately said to the king of Ch’in, “If Ta-wang wants fifteen cities from Chao, the king of Chao should also get something in return. What about giving him Hsien-yang as a gift?’ Hsien-yang was the capital of Ch’in.
- 2013 June 8, “The new masters and commanders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 52:
- From the ground, Colombo’s port does not look like much. […] But viewed from high up in one of the growing number of skyscrapers in Sri Lanka’s capital, it is clear that something extraordinary is happening: China is creating a shipping hub just 200 miles from India’s southern tip.
- Washington D.C. is the capital of the United States of America.
- The Welsh government claims that Cardiff is Europe’s youngest capital.
- (countable) The most important city in the field specified.
- 2010 September, Charlie Brennan, "Active Athletes", St. Louis magazine, ISSN 1090-5723, volume 16, issue 9, page 83:
- Hollywood is the film capital, New York the theater capital, Las Vegas the gambling capital.
- 2010 September, Charlie Brennan, "Active Athletes", St. Louis magazine, ISSN 1090-5723, volume 16, issue 9, page 83:
- (countable) An uppercase letter.
- (uncountable) Knowledge; awareness; proficiency.
- Interpreters need a good amount of cultural capital in order to function efficiently in the profession.
- (countable, by extension) The chief or most important thing.
Usage notes edit
The homophone capitol refers only to a building, usually one that houses the legislative branch of a government, and often one located in a capital city.
Synonyms edit
Antonyms edit
- (antonym(s) of "An uppercase letter"): minuscule
Translations edit
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Adjective edit
capital (not comparable)
- Of prime importance.
- 1708, Francis Atterbury, Fourteen Sermons Preach'd on Several Occasions, Preface:
- a capital article in religion
- 1852, Isaac Taylor, Saturday Evening:
- whatever is capital and essential in Christianity
- Chief, in a political sense, as being the seat of the general government of a state or nation.
- London and Paris are capital cities.
- (comparable, UK, dated) Excellent.
- That is a capital idea!
- 1878, Henry James, An International Episode[2]:
- “He is a capital fellow,” the Englishman in London had said, “and he has got an awfully pretty wife. […] ”
- 1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 166:
- Sometimes he laughed heartily as if he heard some capital joke; by degrees this lessened, and he spoke rapidly, but in very low tones.
- (crime) Punishable by, or involving punishment by, death.
- 1709, [Jonathan Swift], A Project for the Advancement of Religion, and the Reformation of Manners. […], London: […] Benj[amin] Tooke, […], →OCLC, pages 53–54:
- Neither could the Legiſlature in any thing more conſult the Publick Good, than by providing ſome effectual Remedy againſt this Evil, which in ſeveral Caſes deſerves greater Puniſhment than many Crimes that are capital among us.
- 1649, J[ohn] Milton, ΕΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΆΣΤΗΣ [Eikonoklástēs] […], London: […] Matthew Simmons, […], →OCLC:
- to put to death a capital offender
- 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 517:
- Some 1,600 priests were deported, for example, while the total number of capital victims of the military commissions down to 1799 was only around 150.
- Uppercase.
- Antonym: lower-case
- One begins a sentence with a capital letter.
- used to emphasise greatness or absoluteness
- You're a genius with a capital G!
- He's dead with a capital D!
- 2021 February 9, Christina Newland, “Is Tom Hanks part of a dying breed of genuine movie stars?”, in BBC[3]:
- In recent years, much has been made of the lack of new heavyweight male star power in mainstream Hollywood. Talented performers may be everywhere, but Movie Stars, capital M, capital S, are something else.
- Of or relating to the head.
- 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
- Needs must the Serpent now his capital bruise / Expect with mortal pain.
Translations edit
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
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Derived terms edit
- block capital
- block capitals
- capital account
- capital adequacy
- capital appreciation bond
- capital asset
- capital budgeting
- capital city
- capital control
- capital crime
- capital equipment
- capital expenditure
- capital expense
- capital flight
- capital gain
- capital gains tax
- capital good
- capital goods
- capital grant
- capital intensive
- capital-intensive
- capital investment
- capitalism
- capital loss
- capital market
- capital market line
- capital messuage
- capital murder
- capitalness
- capital offence
- capital offense
- capital punishment
- capital share
- capital ship
- capital stock
- capital structure
- capital surplus
- capital value
- cultural capital
- economic capital
- erotic capital
- financial capital
- fixed capital
- human capital
- intellectual capital
- make capital out of
- marginal cost of capital
- medial capital
- personal capital
- provincial capital
- real capital
- risk capital
- sexual capital
- share capital
- small capital
- social capital
- state capital
- venture capital
- weighted-average cost of capital
- working capital
- world capital
Related terms edit
Etymology 2 edit
From Middle English capitale, partly from Old French capital and partly from Late Latin capitellum (“capital or chapiter of a column”),[4] a form of Latin capitulum (“head-like object or structure; chapter”) (whence English capitulum, chapter, and the synonym chapiter (“uppermost part of a column”)), from caput (“head”) + -ulum (diminutive suffix). Doublet of caddie, cadel, cadet, capitellum, caudillo, and Kadet.
Noun edit
capital (plural capitals)
- (countable, architecture) The uppermost part of a column.
- Synonym: chapiter
Translations edit
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References edit
- Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “capital”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
- “capital”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- ^ “capitā̆l, adj.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
- ^ “capital, adj. and n.2”, in OED Online , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
- ^ “capitā̆l, n.(1)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
- ^ “capital, n.1”, in OED Online , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
Anagrams edit
Asturian edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Latin capitālis.
Adjective edit
capital (epicene, plural capitales)
Noun edit
capital f (plural capitales)
- capital city (city designated as seat of government)
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitales)
- capital (money)
Catalan edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Latin capitālis.
Pronunciation edit
Adjective edit
capital m or f (masculine and feminine plural capitals)
Derived terms edit
Noun edit
capital f (plural capitals)
- capital (city)
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitals)
- capital (finance)
Derived terms edit
Further reading edit
- “capital” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
French edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Latin capitālis. Doublet of cheptel.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitaux)
- capital (money and wealth)
Adjective edit
capital (feminine capitale, masculine plural capitaux, feminine plural capitales)
- capital (important)
- La peine capitale est abolie en France depuis les années 1980.
- Capital punishment was abolished in France in the 1980s.
Derived terms edit
Related terms edit
Further reading edit
- “capital”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Anagrams edit
Latin edit
Etymology edit
Substantive form of capitālis (“mortal, relating to the head”).
Pronunciation edit
- (Classical) IPA(key): /ˈka.pi.tal/, [ˈkäpɪt̪äɫ̪]
- (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /ˈka.pi.tal/, [ˈkäːpit̪äl]
Noun edit
capital n (genitive capitālis); third declension
- a capital offence; a crime punishable by death, civil death, or exile
- capital facere ― to commit a capital offence
Declension edit
Third-declension noun (neuter, “pure” i-stem).
Case | Singular | Plural |
---|---|---|
Nominative | capital | capitālia |
Genitive | capitālis | capitālium |
Dative | capitālī | capitālibus |
Accusative | capital | capitālia |
Ablative | capitālī | capitālibus |
Vocative | capital | capitālia |
References edit
- “capital”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- “capital”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
Portuguese edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Latin capitālis. Doublet of cabedal and caudal.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
capital f (plural capitais)
- (geopolitics) capital; capital city (place where the seat of a government is located)
- (figurative) capital (the most important place associated with something)
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitais)
- (finances) capital (money that can be used to acquire goods and services)
- (figurative) anything of prime importance
Derived terms edit
Adjective edit
capital m or f (plural capitais)
- capital (of prime importance)
- (law) capital (involving punishment by death)
- (rare, anatomy) capital (relating to the head)
Related terms edit
Romanian edit
Alternative forms edit
- капитал (capital) — post-1930s Cyrillic spelling
Etymology edit
Borrowed from French capital, Latin capitālis.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
capital n (plural capitaluri)
Declension edit
singular | plural | |||
---|---|---|---|---|
indefinite articulation | definite articulation | indefinite articulation | definite articulation | |
nominative/accusative | (un) capital | capitalul | (niște) capitaluri | capitalurile |
genitive/dative | (unui) capital | capitalului | (unor) capitaluri | capitalurilor |
vocative | capitalule | capitalurilor |
Adjective edit
capital m or n (feminine singular capitală, masculine plural capitali, feminine and neuter plural capitale)
Declension edit
singular | plural | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
masculine | neuter | feminine | masculine | neuter | feminine | ||
nominative/ accusative |
indefinite | capital | capitală | capitali | capitale | ||
definite | capitalul | capitala | capitalii | capitalele | |||
genitive/ dative |
indefinite | capital | capitale | capitali | capitale | ||
definite | capitalului | capitalei | capitalilor | capitalelor |
Romansch edit
Alternative forms edit
Etymology edit
From Latin capitālis, from caput (“head”).
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitals)
Related terms edit
Spanish edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Latin capitālis. Doublet of caudal.
Pronunciation edit
Adjective edit
capital m or f (masculine and feminine plural capitales)
- capital (important)
- Es asunto de capital importancia.
- This is a very important matter.
- capital (relating to a death sentence)
- Lo condenaron a la pena capital.
- He was sentenced to the death penalty.
Derived terms edit
Noun edit
capital m (plural capitales)
Derived terms edit
Noun edit
capital f (plural capitales)
- capital (city)
Further reading edit
- “capital”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014