different between notice vs missive

English

Alternative forms

• not. (abbreviation)

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French notice, from the Latin notitia.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?n??t?s/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?no?t?s/, [?no???s]
• Hyphenation: no?tice

Noun

notice (countable and uncountable, plural notices)

1. (chiefly uncountable) The act of observing; perception.
   • How ready is envy to mingle with the notices which we take of other persons?

2. (countable) A written or printed announcement.

3. (countable) A formal notification or warning.

5. (chiefly uncountable) Advance notification of termination of employment, given by an employer to an employee or vice versa.

6. (countable) A published critical review of a play or the like.
   • 1989, The New York Times Theater Reviews, 1920- (volume 18, page 167)

     The first-night audience, yes. The first-night reviewers, not exactly. The notices have so far been mixed, only The Financial Times having delivered itself of an unequivocal rave.

7. (uncountable) Prior notification.
8. (dated) Attention; respectful treatment; civility.

Synonyms

• (attention): heed, regard; see also Thesaurus:attention

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

notice (third-person singular simple present notices, present participle noticing, simple past and past participle noticed)

1. (transitive, now rare) To remark upon; to mention. [from 17th c.]
   • 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Penguin 2004, p. 88:

     Numberless are the arguments […] that men have used morally and physically, to degrade the sex. I must notice a few.

2. (transitive) To become aware of; to observe. [from 17th c.]
   • 1991, Gregory Widen, Backdraft

     So you punched out a window for ventilation. Was that before or after you noticed you were standing in a lake of gasoline?

3. (obsolete, transitive) To lavish attention upon; to treat (someone) favourably. [17th–19th c.]
   • 1815, Jane Austen, Emma, vol. I, ch. 3

     She would notice her; she would improve her; she would detach her from her bad acquaintance, and introduce her into good society; she would form her opinions and her manners.

4. (intransitive) To be noticeable; to show. [from 20th c.]
   • 1954, Barbara Comyns, Who Was Changed And Who Was Dead, Dorothy 2010, p. 9:

     The blackness didn't notice so much when she was born; but it's unmistakeable now.

Synonyms

• recognize

Antonyms

• ignore
• neglect

Translations

Anagrams

• conite, ecotin, neotic, noetic

French

Etymology

From Latin notitia

Noun

notice f (plural notices)

1. instruction

   Avez-vous lu la notice avant de monter le meuble?

Further reading

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

English

Etymology

15th Century; from Medieval Latin missivus, from mittere (“to send”).

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /?m?s?v/

Noun

missive (plural missives)

1. (formal) A written message; a letter, note or memo.
   • 2008, Claire Armistead, The Guardian, 25 Oct 2008:

     The Madonna letters, which are interspersed with more personal missives in this curious epistolary memoir, accumulate into a rap about the downsides of celebrity - the problems of ageing, of invaded privacy, of becoming vain and impetuously adopting children from other continents.

   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, Chapter 71:

     "Curses throttle thee!" yelled Ahab. "Captain Mayhew, stand by now to receive it"; and taking the fatal missive from Starbuck's hands, he caught it in the slit of the pole, and reached it over towards the boat.

2. (in the plural, Scotland, law) Letters sent between two parties in which one makes an offer and the other accepts it.
3. (obsolete) One who is sent; a messenger.
   • c. 1606: Macbeth by Shakespeare

     Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it came missives from the King, who all hailed me ‘Thane of Cawdor,’ by which title these Weird Sisters saluted me and referred me to the coming on of time with ‘Hail king that shalt be.’

Translations

Adjective

missive (not comparable)

1. Specially sent; intended or prepared to be sent.

   a letter missive

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Ayliffe to this entry?)

2. (obsolete) Serving as a missile; intended to be thrown.
   • 1700, John Dryden, Cymon And Iphigenia

     The missive weapons fly.

Related terms

• See mission for terms etymologically related to send

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “missive”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

French

Pronunciation

Noun

missive f (plural missives)

1. missive

Italian

Noun

missive f

1. plural of missiva