Dictionary

syllabication en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /sɪˌlæbɪˈkeɪʃən/ (Received-Pronunciation)
• sĭlă'bĭkāʹshən (Received-Pronunciation)

Etymology

First attested in 1631; from the Medieval Latin sillabicātio, syllabicātio, noun of action of the verb syllabicō, from syllaba (“syllable”).

Meanings

1. (countable, uncountable) The act of syllabifying; syllabification.
   • Instances both of the unemphatic do and of the distinct syllabication of the final ed are numerous in the present play. 1857, George Lillie Craik, The English of Shakespeare, part 2: “Philological Commentary on Shakespeare’s Julius Cæsar”, act 1, scene 1, page 73
   • syllabicate 2    syllabication 1 syllabify 2      syllabification 1 syllabize 1     syllabization 3 One first-class verb, two first-class nouns, but neither of those nouns belonging to that verb. It is absurd enough, & any of several ways out would do; that indeed is why none of them is taken. The best thing would be to accept the most recognized verb syllabize, give it the now non-existent noun syllabization, & relegate all the rest to the Superfluous words; but there is no authority both willing & able to issue such decrees. 1926, Henry Watson Fowler, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1st ed., Oxford at the Clarendon Press), page 590, column 2, “syllabize &c.” syllabize &c. A verb & a noun are clearly sometimes needed for the notion of dividing words into syllables. The possible pairs seem to be the following (the number after each word means — 1, that it is in fairly common use; 2, that it is on record; 3, that it is not given in OED): — syllabate 3 syllabation 2
   • I sweare unto thee by the crisse-crosse row, by the whole Alphabet, and Sillabication of the letters. 1631, James Mabbe, tr. of Fernando de Rojas’s 1499 The Spanish Bawd, represented in Celestina: or, The Tragicke-comedy of Calisto and Melibea, chapter 18, page 180

Forms

Deriveds

missyllabication