Dictionary

appurtenance en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• ə-pûr′tn-əns
• (Northern-California, US) audio
• /əˈpɜr tn əns/ (General-American)

Etymology

From Middle English appurtenaunce, from Anglo-Norman apurtenance and Old French apartenance, from apartenir, from Latin appertineō (“to belong, to appertain”). More at appertain. By surface analysis, appertain + -ance.

Meanings

1. That which appertains to something else; a belonging, accompaniment, adjunct, appendage, attribute, or accessory ; an addition.
   • Indeed, that was as it should be; for she was only an appurtenance of my mattress, or self-acting bedstead on four castors. 1879, Robert Louis Stevenson, “[Velay.] .”, in Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes, 1st American edition, Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC, page 17:
   • The youngsters, not immediately within sight, seemed rather bright and desirable appurtenances than otherwise; the incidents of daily life were not without humorousness and jollity in their aspect there. 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume I, London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC, phase the first (The Maiden), page 36:
   • Duchess Meg soon forgot this unworthy wedding-gift, such was her rapture in the other, the so august, appurtenances of her new life. What with her fine silk gowns and farthingales, and her powder-closet, and the canopied bed she slept in—a bed bigger far than the room she had slept in with her sisters, and standing in a room far bigger than her father’s cottage [...] 1911 October 26, Max Beerbohm, Zuleika Dobson, or, An Oxford Love Story, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: John Lane Company, published 1912, →OCLC:
2. (in-plural) Equipment used for some specific task; gear.
   • These “millennials” are, without a doubt, the most narcissistic and hopeless cohort I have witnessed in my 35 long years on this stationary planet. Consider, first, their absurd sartorial appurtenances, such as leggings sewn with skinny girths. 2014 August 2, Teddy Wayne, “A Parchment on Millennials”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
   • A couple of hair gloves, with a flesh-brush, may be added to the toilet appurtenances. 1876, Eliza Bisbee Duffey, Our Behaviour: A Manual of Etiquette and Dress of the Best American Society, Philadelphia:
   • Araminta, come I'll talk ſeriouſly to you now, could you but ſee vvith my Eyes the buffoonry of one Scene of Addreſs, a Lover, ſet out with all his Equipage and Appurtenances; […] 1693, Will[iam] Congreve, The Old Batchelour, a Comedy. […], London: […] Peter Buck, […], →OCLC, Act II, scene [ii], page 14:
   • In the case of the urban consumer of nature writing, of course, the mud is to be hosed off one's mental Range Rover immediately one lifts one's eyes from the page and gives silent thanks for the civilised appurtenances of hot yoga and flat whites. 2013 July 6, Steven Poole, “Is our love of nature writing bourgeois escapism?”, in The Guardian:
3. A subordinate interest in land which benefits a principal estate, which cannot be detached from or held separately to that estate; an appurtenant interest.
   • It is well settled that a water right may pass with land as an appurtenance thereto, or as a parcel thereof. 1908, Samuel Charles Wiel, Water Rights in the Western States, page 340:
   • Also I will that anon after the said nine years after my decease determined that my said feoffees make estate of all the said manors, lands and tenements with the appurtenance to my next heir and to the heirs of his body lawfully begotten. 2019, Michèle Schindler, Lovell our Dogge:
4. A modifier that is appended or prepended to another word to coin a new word that expresses belonging.
5. The state or quality of being an appurtenance.
   • Thus, these two characteristics — appurtenance and the lack of need for any act of acquisition - go together and depend upon each other; one is merely looking at different facets of the same thing. 1970, United States. Congress. Senate. Interior and Insular Affairs, Outer Continental Shelf, page 275:
   • A second father is Kurt Koffka for his principle of appurtenance that he expanded from motions to colors. 2005, Jaan Valsiner, Heinz Werner and Developmental Science, page 262:

Forms

Relateds

appertain

Synonyms

contenement

Translations (53)

pt apetrechos (equipment for some specific task) · hu velejáró (appendage added to something else) · hu tartozék ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · pl formant dzierżawczy ((language) modifier appended or prepended to another word to express belonging) · hu hozzávaló (equipment for some specific task) · mk о́према (equipment for some specific task) · pl podrzędność (state or quality of being an appurtenance) · pl atrybut (appendage added to something else) · sh pripadnost (thing to which another pertains) · pl przynależność ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · ro apendice (appendage added to something else) · ro anexă (appendage added to something else) · pl akompaniament (appendage added to something else) · sh pribor (equipment for some specific task) · ru снаряжение (equipment for some specific task) · nl bijbehoren (appendage added to something else) · de Ausrüstungsgegenstand (equipment for some specific task) · de Zubehör ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · pl wyposażenie (equipment for some specific task) · hu kellék (equipment for some specific task) · sh prinadležnost (thing to which another pertains) · fi apuväline (equipment for some specific task) · de Grundstücksbestandteil ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · bg придатък (appendage added to something else) · hu tartozék (appendage added to something else) · pl przybory (equipment for some specific task) · de Ausrüstung (equipment for some specific task) · hu szolgalom ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · pl rynsztunek (equipment for some specific task) · pl oporządzenie (equipment for some specific task) · de Anhang (appendage added to something else) · es pertrechos (equipment for some specific task) · pl uzupełnienie (appendage added to something else) · fi lisäosa (appendage added to something else) · de Grundstückszubehör ((law) minor property that passes with the main property) · sh prinadležnost (appendage added to something else) · pl sprzęt (equipment for some specific task) · pl akcesorium (appendage added to something else) · pl ekwipunek (equipment for some specific task) · pl parafernalia (equipment for some specific task) · mk до́даток (appendage added to something else) · pl przynależność (state or quality of being an appurtenance) · fi liite (appendage added to something else) · de Rüstzeug (equipment for some specific task) · de Anhängsel (appendage added to something else) · es aparejos (equipment for some specific task) · pl dodatek (appendage added to something else) · pl przynależność (thing to which another pertains) · pl akcesoria (equipment for some specific task) · mk при́бор (equipment for some specific task) · hu felszerelés (equipment for some specific task) · de modisches Zubehör (equipment for some specific task) · pl załącznik (appendage added to something else)