subvention

Etymology

From Middle French subvention, from Late Latin subventio.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /sʌbˈvɛnʃ(ə)n/

Noun

subvention (countable and uncountable, plural subventions)

1. A subsidy; provision of financial or other support.
   • 1986, John le Carré, A Perfect Spy:

     Inside its skirts he carried his shopping for Miss Dubber: the bacon from Mr. Aitken, only mind and tell him he's to cut it on number five, give him half a chance he'll make it thicker. And tell that Mr. Crosse three of his tomatoes were rotten last week, not just bad, rotten. If I don't have replacements I'll never go to him again. Pym had followed her instructions to the letter, though not with the ferocity she would have wished, for both Crosse and Aitken were recipients of his secret subventions, and for years had been sending Miss Dubber bills for only half what she had spent.

2. The act of coming under.
   • Stackhouse

     the subvention of a cloud

3. The act of relieving, as of a burden; support; aid; assistance; help.

Verb

subvention (third-person singular simple present subventions, present participle subventioning, simple past and past participle subventioned)

1. To subsidise.
   • 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin 2003, p. 136:

     His task was, it is true, made easier by the need of the English to remove troops to put down the 1745-6 Jacobite Rising, which the French had subventioned.

Noun

subvention

1. Genitive singular form of subventio.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /syb.vɑ̃.sjɔ̃/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

subvention f (plural subventions)

1. subsidy
2. grant

Further reading

• “subvention” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).