warrant

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a type of security issued by a corporation (usually together with a bond or preferred stock) that gives the holder the right to purchase a certain amount of common stock at a stated price

   as a sweetener they offered warrants along with the fixed-income securities

2. 2
   verb

   stand behind and guarantee the quality, accuracy, or condition of

   The dealer warrants all the cars they sell.

3. 3
   verb

   show to be reasonable or provide adequate ground for

   The emergency does not warrant all of us buying guns

4. 4
   noun

   Authorization or certification; a sanction, as given by a superior.

   Two years after the first appearance on the London stage by an English actress, a royal warrant of 1660 decreed that women rather than boys were to play all female roles.

5. 5
   noun

   Something that provides assurance or confirmation; a guarantee or proof.

   a warrant of authenticity; a warrant for success

6. 6
   noun

   An order that serves as authorization; especially a voucher authorizing payment or receipt of money.

   And also be in enactid by the auctorite aforseid that no manꝰ [man's] clerke or clerkes or other parsone or parsones do wryte or make any maner of wryting warraunt or warrauntes, upon any maner gyfte or graunte made by the Kynges Highnes or by any other his Gracys offycers as aforsaide, [...]

7. 7
   noun

   An option, usually issued together with another security and with a term at issue greater than a year, to buy other securities of the issuer.

   But they [police juries] have no power to [...] issue promissory notes or warrants to cover funds which may be set aside for this purpose in future taxation without express authority from the supreme political power of the state.

8. 8
   noun

   A judicial writ authorizing an officer to make a search, seizure, or arrest, or to execute a judgment.

   an arrest warrant issued by the court

Etymology

The noun is derived from Middle English warant (“protector; guard, shield, protection”), from Anglo-Norman warrant, Old Northern French warant, warand, a variant of Old French guarant, garant, garand (“assurance, guarantee; authorization, permission; protector; protection, safety”) (modern French garant), from Frankish *warand, present participle of *warjan (“to fend off; to stop, thwart”). The word is cognate with Old High German werento (“guarantor”). The verb is derived from Middle English warrant, waranten (“to give protection; to protect, shield; to assure, pledge, promise; to guarantee”)…