compensation

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The act or principle of compensating.

   Human labor, through all its forms, from the sharpening of a stake to the construction of a city or an epic, is one immense illustration of the perfect compensation of the universe.

2. 2
   noun

   Something which is regarded as an equivalent; something which compensates for loss.

   The parliament which dissolved the monastic foundations […] vouchsafed not a word toward securing the slightest compensation to the dispossessed owners.

3. 3
   noun

   the act of compensating for service or loss or injury

4. 4
   noun

   something (such as money) given or received as payment or reparation (as for a service or loss or injury)

5. 5
   noun

   (psychiatry) a defense mechanism that conceals your undesirable shortcomings by exaggerating desirable behaviors

6. 6
   noun

   The extinction of debts of which two persons are reciprocally debtors by the credits of which they are reciprocally creditors; the payment of a debt by a credit of equal amount.

7. 7
   noun

   A recompense or reward for service.

8. 8
   noun

   An equivalent stipulated for in contracts for the sale of real estate, in which it is customary to provide that errors in description, etc., shall not avoid, but shall be the subject of compensation.

Etymology

From Middle English compensacioun, from Old French compensacion, from Latin compensātiōnem, accusative singular of compensātiō. Equivalent to compensate + -ion.