Significancy

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The quality of having importance or meaning within a particular context or situation
2. A state of being meaningful or having substantial value in interpretation or impact
3. The condition of possessing relevance or significance in an event, idea, or object

Etymology: "Significancy" is a near-synonym of "significance" that came into English through Latin, where "significantia" was built from the verb "significare," meaning "to signify" or "to make known." The Latin root combines "signum," a sign or mark, with "facere," to make, so the underlying idea is making a sign visible. English took the stem from Latin and then attached the suffix "-ancy," which English uses to form nouns of quality or state from adjectives and participles, as in "constancy" or "redundancy." The result is a word that means the same thing as "significance" but with a slightly different ending. Both forms trace back to the same Latin source, so "significancy" is best understood as a variant formed on the same pattern rather than a separate sense. Its meaning is the state of being important or of having weight, which connects it to the older Latin notion of something that makes a meaning clear.

Synonyms: importance, meaning

Antonyms: insignificance, unimportance