| abbreviation |
| Definition: A shortened version of a word. |
| Example:
The words laser (an acronym), zip (an anacronym), BBC (an initialism), and Ltd. (an abbreviated form of the word Limited) are all types of abbreviations. Note: the symbol @, when it stands for the word at, is not an abbreviation; it is a phonogram. |
| Etymology: The word derives via Middle French from the Late Latin abbreviationem, made brief (from ad, to + breviare, shorten). |
| OED: The first OED citation for the word in this sense is from 1727: "Most of the books we see now-a-days are full of those manglings and abbreviations." (Jonathan Swift, Letter on Eng. Wks. 1755 II. i. 188) |