corporation
(kɔːpəˈreɪʃən)
Also 6 -acyon, 6–7 -cion.
[ad. L. corporātiōn-em (Tertullian), n. of action f. corporā-re to embody; in med. (Anglo) L. used in sense 2 below. Also in mod.F.: see Littré.]
† 1. The action of incorporating; the condition of being incorporated. Obs.
| 1439 Rotul. Parl. V. 9/1, 18 Hen. VI, c. 20 As touchyng the Corporation of the Toune of Plymouth. 1530 Palsgr. 209/1 Corporation, corporation. 1540 Act 32 Hen. VIII, c. 42 Thother company called ‘the Surgeons’, be not incorporate, nor have anny maner of corporation. 1542 in Strype Eccl. Mem. I. l. 376 An act..for the union and corporation of small and exile benefices. |
2. A number of persons united, or regarded as united, in one body; a body of persons.
| 1534 More On the Passion Wks. 1348/2 He [Christ] doth..incorporate all christen folke and hys owne bodye together in one corporacyon mistical. 1569 Golding Heminges Post. Ded. 14 The whole Churche..the whole corporation of those that are registered in the booke of life. 1597 Hooker Eccl. Pol. v. lxxix. §14 Some to appertain unto several corporations or companies of men. 1647 Clarendon Hist. Reb. ii. (1843) 60/1 The most odious..projects..framed, and executed, by almost a corporation of that religion. 1650 Fuller Pisgah iii. iv. 324 David [was] a grand preserver of them [Nethinims], who first made them a Corporation. |
3. a. Law. A body corporate legally authorized to act as a single individual; an artificial person created by royal charter, prescription, or act of the legislature, and having authority to preserve certain rights in perpetual succession.
A corporation may be either aggregate, comprising many individuals, as the mayor and burgesses of a town, etc., or sole, consisting of only one person and his successors, as a king, bishop, or parson of a parish. According to their nature, corporations are termed civil, ecclesiastical (U.S. religious), eleemosynary, municipal, etc.
| 1611 Speed Hist. Gt. Brit. v. iv. 23 If there be any, bee hee priuate person, or be it corporation. 1614 Raleigh Hist. World ii. 483 The Corporation or Body politike of the Citizens of Capua. 1751 Johnson Rambler No. 177 ¶10 Some fragment of antiquity, as the seal of an antient corporation. 1765 Blackstone Comm. I. 469 Corporations aggregate consist of many persons united together into one society, and are kept up by a perpetual succession of members so as to continue for ever..Corporations sole consist of one person only and his successors. 1818 Cruise Digest (ed. 2) V. 150 Corporations aggregate cannot levy fines. 1842 Dickens Amer. Notes iv, What we should term a Company of Proprietors, but what they call in America a Corporation. 1856 Stanley Sinai & Pal. xiv. (1858) 446 The ‘Santa Casa’ is spoken of by them as a living person, a corporation sole on which the whole city depends. 1875 Poste Gaius i. Comm. (ed. 2) 154 Some Universities have a visible existence in a number of individual members, and are then called Corporations. |
b. Frequently used in the titles of incorporated companies, e.g. the London Assurance Corporation, Irish Land C., Oriental Bank C., Peruvian C., etc.
4. An incorporated company of traders having (originally) the monopoly and control of their particular trade in a borough or other place; a trade-guild, a city ‘company’. (Now so called only in legal or formal language.)
| 1530 in W. H. Turner Select. Rec. Oxford 87 Ther is a corporacyon made by the auctorite of the Mayre amongst fischmongers w{supt}yn the..towne. 1634 Rainbow Labour (1635) 40 The greatest of our Common-wealth have inrolled their names into the protection of some Corporation in this City. 1703 Lond. Gaz. No. 4443/3 The several Corporations, or City Companies, marched from their respective Halls. 1724 Swift Drapier's Lett. vii, The whole corporations of weavers in silk and woollen. |
5. spec. The municipal corporation; the civic authorities of a borough or incorporated town or city; the mayor, aldermen, and councillors. (A leading current use.)
| a 1734 North Exam. iii. viii. §34. 607 The Lord Mayor being Head of the Corporation. 1829 Southey Pilgr. Compostella iv, The Corporation A fund for their keep supplied. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) I. 629 A branch of the Corporation of the City of London. |
6. The body; the abdomen; esp. when large and prominent. colloq. and vulgar.
| 1753 Smollett Ct. Fathom (1813) I. 156 Sirrah! my corporation is made up of good wholesome English fat. 1785 Grose Dict. Vulgar Tongue s.v., He has a glorious corporation. 1849 C. Brontë Shirley xvi. 242 Looming large in full canonicals..with the dignity of an ample corporation. 1870 Spurgeon Treas. Dav. Ps. xvii. 10 Eglon was a notable instance that a well-fed corporation is no security to life. |
7. attrib. and Comb., as corporation carter, corporation clerk, corporation labourer, corporation land, corporation law, corporation lawyer, corporation line, corporation oath, corporation seal, corporation stock, corporation stop, corporation tax, etc. (chiefly U.S.); Corporation Act, the act of 1661 requiring all persons holding municipal offices to acknowledge the royal supremacy, to abjure resistance to the king, and to subscribe a declaration against the Solemn League and Covenant, and making ineligible for office all persons who had not within a year partaken of the communion as administered by the Church of England.
| 1651 Baxter Inf. Bapt. 318 When all Burgesses..are entered into a Corporation by the Corporation Oath or Covenant. 1672 Essex Papers (Camden) I. 32 This very thing of Corporacion Lands. 1714 in Picton L'pool Munic. Rec. (1886) II. 78 The Corporation Seale. 1771 Carroll Papers in Maryland Hist. Mag. XIV. 137 Does not the Corporation Law require Broader tred than 6 inches? 1776 Adam Smith W.N. I. i. x. 133 The Corporation spirit has never prevailed among them. 1777 Sheridan Sch. Scand. iii. iii, All the family race-cups and corporation-bowls! 1841 C. Cist Cincinnati 29 Between Main street and the corporation line. 1855 Macaulay Hist. Eng. xi, A bill repealing the Corporation Act, which had been passed by the Cavalier Parliament. 1875 Mass. Ho. Repr. Doc. 15 (on Taxation) 122 The general corporation tax. 1881 Instr. Census Clerks (1885) 22 Corporation Clerk. Ibid. 34 Corporation Carter. Ibid. 87 Corporation Labourer. 1889 Cent. Dict., Corporation-stop, a stop in a gas- or water-main for the use of the gas- or water-company only. (U.S.) 1893 ‘O. Thanet’ Stories Western Town 215 He went away for an interview with the corporation lawyer. 1901 W. G. Cordingley Dict. Stock Exch. Terms 29 Corporation Stocks refer to the Stocks, Loans and Debentures of the Corporations of the various towns and boroughs in the United Kingdom. 1911 Amer. Yr. Bk. 1910 326 The President's suggestion was followed, and the corporation tax became law. 1920 Act 10 & 11 Geo. V c. 18 §52 There shall be charged..a duty (in this Act referred to as ‘corporation profits tax’) of..five per cent. of those profits. 1931 J. T. Adams Epic of Amer. viii. 230 A corporation lawyer building up a merger of competing plants. 1965 New Statesman 16 Apr. 622/2 The corporation tax makes gilt-edged stocks less attractive to some investors. |
Hence corpoˈrational a., of or belonging to a corporation; corpoˈrationer (nonce-wd.), a member of a corporation; corpoˈrationism (nonce-wd.), the system or principle of corporate action.
| 1836 T. Hook G. Gurney III. 238 Among all the soldier-officers, and mayors and corporationers. 1866 Dickens Lett. 18 Jan., I sat pining under the imbecility of constitutional and corporational idiots. 1883 Advance (Chicago) 16 Aug., Individualism against corporationism. 1965 Guardian 4 Sept. 6/1 John Manduell's birthday message in this week's ‘Radio Times’..sounded like the commonest kind of Corporational humbug. |