excise

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No doubt, when the excise is abolished, many other articles will be employed for the same purpose To describe the railroads, which are every hour departing for every point of the compass, would take up too much space.

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Definitions (19)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. noun An internal tax imposed on the production, sale, or consumption of a commodity or the use of a service within a country: excises on tobacco, liquor, and long-distance telephone calls.
  2. noun A licensing charge or a fee levied for certain privileges.
  3. transitive verb To levy an excise on.

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Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (3)

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Examples

  • The duty was branded with the hateful epithet of an excise, a species of taxation, it was said, so peculiarly oppressive as to be abhorred even in England, and which was totally incompatible with the spirit of liberty. —  Life and Times of Washington
  • The first was the excise, an internal revenue on distilled spirits. —  George Washington
  • No doubt, when the excise is abolished, many other articles will be employed for the same purpose To describe the railroads, which are every hour departing for every point of the compass, would take up too much space. —  Rides on Railways
  • Added to these inherited prejudices of the Irish and Scotch-Irish settlers in western Pennsylvania against the excise was a local complaint that they lacked roads for transporting their grain across the mountains to market and were prohibited from floating it down to New Orleans both by the distance and by the hostility of the Spanish. —  The United States of America, Part 1
  • No doubt, when the excise is abolished, many other articles will be employed for the same purpose. —  Rides on Railways
 

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Excise has been looked up 235 times, favorited once, listed 8 times, and commented on 0 times.

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Etymologies (5)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. Middle Dutch excijs, alteration (influenced by Latin excīsus, past participle of excīdere, to cut out) of accijs, tax, probably from Old French acceis, partly from Vulgar Latin *accēnsum (Latin ad-, ad- + Latin cēnsus, tax; see census) and partly from Old French assise, legislative ordinance; see assize.
  2. Latin excīdere, excīs- : ex-, ex- + caedere, to cut; see kaə-id- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (3)

  1. Formerly also excize; from Latin excisus, past participle of excidere, cut out, from ex, out, + cædere, cut: see excide.
  2. A corruption (associated, as in the 2d extract below, with excise, from Latin excisus, past participle of excidere, cut off: see excise) of earlier accise = Middle Dutch aksiis, aksys = Greek aceise = Danish accise = Swedish accis, excise; cf. modern F. accise, Italian accisa (Middle Latin accisia), excise, apparently a corruption (as if from Latin accisus, past participle of accidere, cut into) of Old French assis, assessments, taxes (cf. Spanish Portuguese sisa, excise, tax), from assise, an assize, sessions: see assize, assess, size. The assumed change of assise to accise is irreg., and the relation of the Teutonic and Roman forms is uncertain.
  3. from excise, n.
 

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/ɛkˈsaɪz/
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