Duplication

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /djuː.plɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/

Definitions

1. The process of making an exact copy of something ; an object or item that is an exact copy of another
2. The action of reproducing something identically ; a thing that has been replicated from an original
3. The act of creating a duplicate or replica of an original ; an item that exists as a repeated version of the first

Etymology: Latin "duplicare" meant "to double," and its derivative "duplicatio" referred to the act of doubling something, or folding it over. English took the word through Middle French "duplication" and Middle English "duplicacioun," so the core sense of making a second version has been present since the Middle Ages. Its noun form is built from "duplicate," which itself comes from the same Latin verb, with the suffix "-ion" added to turn the action into a noun. The word's meaning has narrowed over time. Where the Latin root was about doubling a quantity, modern English uses "duplication" mainly for the making of an identical copy, whether of a document, a file, or a biological cell. Its sense of reproducing something faithfully is the one that dominates today, so a photocopy or a cloned gene is a "duplication" in the same way a doubled sum is.

Synonyms: copy, replication, reproduction, reiteration, repeat

Antonyms: original, uniqueness, singularity