impressment

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   historical: the forcible recruitment of people into military service, especially sailors into a navy

   Naval impressment separated many sailors from merchant ships and their families.

2. 2
   noun

   rare: the act or effect of impressing someone, or a display intended to impress

   He opened the parcel with exaggerated impressment for the benefit of the audience.

Formed from impress and -ment. The historical service sense arose from impress meaning to seize or compel into public duty, not from the modern sense of producing admiration; a rarer general sense refers to the act or effect of impressing.

Topics