different between appliance vs appointment

English

Etymology

Recorded since the 1560s. From the English apply +? -ance.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??pla??ns/
• Rhymes: -a??ns

Noun

appliance (countable and uncountable, plural appliances)

1. An implement, an instrument or apparatus designed (or at least used) as a means to a specific end (often specified), especially:
   • c. 1597, William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part 2, Act III, Scene 1,^[1]

     Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose

     To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude;

     And in the calmest and most stillest night,

     With all appliances and means to boot,

     Deny it to a king?

   • 1861, George Eliot, Silas Marner, Part 2, Chapter 16,^[2]

     “ […] Oh, the pipe! won’t you have it lit again, father?” said Eppie, lifting that medicinal appliance from the ground.

   • 1939, John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, New York: Viking, Chapter 3, p. 20,^[3]

     […] sleeping life waiting to be spread and dispersed, every seed armed with an appliance of dispersal, twisting darts and parachutes for the wind, little spears and balls of tiny thorns, and all waiting for animals and for the wind, for a man’s trouser cuff or the hem of a woman’s skirt […]

   1. A non-manual apparatus or device, powered electrically or by another small motor, used in homes to perform domestic functions (household appliance) and/or in offices.

   2. An attachment, a piece of equipment to adapt another tool or machine to a specific purpose.
2. (obsolete) The act of applying.

   Synonym: application

   • 1658, Elias Ashmole, The Way to Bliss, London: Nath. Brook, Book 2, Chapter 2 “Of Health,” p. 75,^[4]

     […] there be three things, and every one full of under-branches belonging to this Art and way of Healing: The first is knowledge of the Diseases: the second is the Remedies against them: and the third of the appliance of Remedies; All which should be traversed in this Discourse.
3. (obsolete) A means of eliminating or counteracting something undesirable, especially an illness.

   Synonyms: cure, medicine, remedy

   • c. 1600, William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act IV, Scene 3,^[5]

     […] Diseases desperate grown

     By desperate appliance are reliev’d,

     Or not at all.

   • 1617, Thomas Middleton and William Rowley, A Fair Quarrel, London: I.T., Act II, Scene 1,^[6]

     Physician. Now I haue found you out, you are in loue.

     Jane. I thinke I am, what your appliance now?

     Can all your Paracelsian mixtures cure it,

     ’T must be a Surgeon of the Ciuill Law,

     I feare that must cure me.

   • c. 1775, Thomas Hull, Moral Tales in Verse, London: George Cawthorn, 1797, Volume 2, “The Advantages of Repentance,” pp. 161-162,^[7]

     With charitable care

     They rais’d him up, and, by appliance meet,

     Quicken’d the pulse, and bade it flow anew.

   • 1867, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (translator), The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri, Purgatory, Canto 30,^[8]

     So low he fell, that all appliances

     For his salvation were already short,

     Save showing him the people of perdition.

4. (obsolete, rare) Willing service, willingness to act as someone wishes.

   Synonym: compliance

   • c. 1602, William Shakespeare, All’s Well That Ends Well, Act II, Scene 1,^[9]

     And hearing your high majesty is touch’d

     With that malignant cause wherein the honour

     Of my dear father’s gift stands chief in power,

     I come to tender it and my appliance

     With all bound humbleness.

Hyponyms

Translations

References

• Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, G.&C. Merriam Co., 1967

Spanish

Etymology

From English appliance.

Noun

appliance m (plural appliances)

1. (rare) appliance

   Synonym: electrodoméstico

English

Etymology

From Middle French apointement (French appointement). See appoint.

Pronunciation

• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /??p??nt.m?nt/
• (Southern American English) IPA^(key): /??p??nt.m?nt/, [??p????n?m?n?], [??p??????m?n?]

Noun

appointment (plural appointments)

1. The act of appointing a person to hold an office or to have a position of trust

2. The state of being appointed to a service or office; an office to which one is appointed

3. Stipulation; agreement; the act of fixing by mutual agreement.
4. An arrangement between people to meet; an engagement.

5. (religion) Decree; direction; established order or constitution.
6. (law) The exercise of the power of designating (under a power of appointment) a person to enjoy an estate or other specific property; also, the instrument by which the designation is made.
7. (government) The assignment of a person by an official to perform a duty, such as a presidential appointment of a judge to a court.
8. (in the plural) Equipment, furniture.
9. (US) A honorary part or exercise, as an oration, etc., at a public exhibition of a college.

10. (obsolete) The allowance paid to a public officer.

Synonyms

• command
• designation
• direction
• equipment
• establishment
• order

Antonyms

• (act of appointing): dismissal

Translations

References

• appointment in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

See also

• calendar
• meeting
• schedule