Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act of deposing, as from high office.
  • noun The act of depositing, especially the laying down of matter by a natural process.
  • noun Something deposited; a deposit.
  • noun Law Sworn testimony recorded for use in court at a later date.
  • noun The removal of Jesus from the cross.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The act of depositing; a laying down; lodgment or precipitation: as, the deposition of stones by a moving glacier, or of sediment by a river; the deposition of a metallic coating by galvanism.
  • noun That which is deposited or placed; a deposit.
  • noun The act of laying down or bringing to notice; presentation.
  • noun Declaration; assertion; specifically, in law, testimony taken under interrogatories, written or oral, before an authorized officer, to be used as a substitute for the production of the witness in open court.
  • noun In civil and common law: A deposit; a naked bailment of goods, to be kept for the bailor without reward, and to be returned when he shall require it, or delivered according to the object or purpose of the original trust.
  • noun The thing so deposited.
  • noun The act of deposing a person from an office, or of depriving him of a dignity; specifically, the act of dethroning, or of removing from some important office or trust.
  • noun In surgery, the depression of the lens of the eye in the operation of couching.
  • noun The burial of a saint's body, or the act of transferring his remains or relics to a new resting-place or shrine; the festival commemorating such burial or translation: as, the Deposition of St. Martin.
  • noun In geology, the accumulation of sediments, or the precipitation of minerals (particularly ores) from solution.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act of depositing or deposing; the act of laying down or thrown down; precipitation.
  • noun The act of bringing before the mind; presentation.
  • noun The act of setting aside a sovereign or a public officer; deprivation of authority and dignity; displacement; removal.
  • noun That which is deposited; matter laid or thrown down; sediment; alluvial matter.
  • noun An opinion, example, or statement, laid down or asserted; a declaration.
  • noun (Law) The act of laying down one's testimony in writing; also, testimony laid or taken down in writing, under oath or affirmation, before some competent officer, and in reply to interrogatories and cross-interrogatories.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The removal of someone from office.
  • noun The act of depositing material, especially by a natural process; the resultant deposit.
  • noun chemistry The production of a thin film of material onto an existing surface.
  • noun law The process of taking sworn testimony out of court; the testimony so taken.
  • noun meteorology The formation of snow or frost directly from water vapor.
  • noun physics The transformation of a gas into a solid without an intermediate liquid phase (reverse of sublimation)
  • noun religion The formal placement of relics in a church or shrine, and the feast day commemorating it.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the natural process of laying down a deposit of something
  • noun (law) a pretrial interrogation of a witness; usually conducted in a lawyer's office
  • noun the act of deposing someone; removing a powerful person from a position or office
  • noun the act of putting something somewhere

Etymologies

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  • "Its leader, Khomeini, made adroit use of Shiite history and Iranian nationalism to attract ever-increasing support. He managed to unite the disparate anti-Shah forces, both religious and secular -- including Marxists of various shades -- by his most radical demand: the deposition of Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi."

    - Dilip Hiro, The Clash of Islam and Democracy in Iran, tomdispatch.com, 28 June 2009.

    June 29, 2009