Assigne

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A person to whom a right, property, or legal claim has been formally transferred by another party
2. The individual who receives a transferred right, title, or interest under a legal agreement
3. Someone designated to take over a legal entitlement or possession from the original holder

Etymology: An assign, or assignee, is a person to whom a right, property or claim is legally transferred. The word comes from Anglo-Norman and Old French "assigné," the past participle of "assigner," meaning "to allot" or "to designate." English borrowed the noun form in the later Middle Ages, and it survives mainly in legal and financial contexts, where it stands beside its more familiar relative "assignee," which English formed later by adding the Anglo-French suffix "-ee" to the verb. The underlying verb goes back to Latin "assignare," built from "ad-" ("to") and "signare" ("to mark"), from "signum," a mark or sign. To assign something was originally to put a mark or seal on it, identifying it as belonging to a particular owner or purpose. That sense of marking out a share is still visible in the modern verb, which means to allocate a task or to attribute something to a source.

Synonyms: allot, allocate, designate

Antonyms: withdraw, revoke