English Online Dictionary. What means amount? What does amount mean?
English
Etymology
From Middle English amounten (“to mount up to, come up to, signify”), from Old French amonter (“to amount to”), from amont, amunt (“uphill, upward”), from the prepositional phrase a mont (“toward or to a mountain or heap”), from Latin ad montem, from ad (“to”) + montem, accusative of mons (“mountain”).
Pronunciation
- enPR: ə.mount', IPA(key): /əˈmaʊnt/
- Rhymes: -aʊnt
Noun
amount (plural amounts)
- The total, aggregate or sum of material (not applicable to discrete numbers or units or items in standard English).
- A quantity or volume.
- (nonstandard, sometimes proscribed) The number (the sum) of elements in a set.
Usage notes
- In formal contexts, the term amount is reserved for immeasurable things (that is, things that one cannot put a specific quantity to, such as intangibles), and the term quantity is used as the correct term for things that can be measured. However, even when referring to something measurable, the terms amount and quantity are usually (incorrectly) used interchangeably in colloquial contexts.
Hyponyms
- batch
- bolus
- notional amount
- principal amount
- serving (helping, portion)
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
amount (third-person singular simple present amounts, present participle amounting, simple past and past participle amounted)
- (intransitive, followed by to) To total or evaluate.
- (intransitive, followed by to) To be the tantamount to; to reach up to the level of.
- (obsolete, intransitive) To go up; to ascend.
Translations
See also
- extent
- magnitude
- measurement
- number
- quantity
- size
References
Further reading
- “amount”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “amount”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
- “amount”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
Anagrams
- mantou, moutan, outman, tomaun