Indication

How to spell indication

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce indication

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does indication mean?

1. nounA sign, signal, or piece of evidence that points to or suggests something.

Indication in a sentence

• The flickering lights were a clear indication of a wiring fault.

• There was no indication that the meeting had been cancelled.

Where does indication come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin indicatio, a noun built on the verb indicare, meaning 'to point out' or 'to make known'. That verb combined the prefix in-, here carrying the sense of 'toward', with dicare, 'to declare or proclaim', which is closely related to dicere, 'to say' and to the root that gives us 'dictate' and 'index'. The Latin sense was literally one of pointing something out so that it could be seen or understood. English took the word in the fifteenth century, partly through Old French indication, to mean a sign that points to or reveals something. The same dic root sits inside 'indicate', 'verdict', and 'dictionary', all of which involve speaking, pointing, or declaring, and remembering that family helps fix the single c and the -ation ending.

How the word is built

• in- (toward)
• dic (from dicare/dicere: to point out, declare)
• -ation (noun-forming suffix)