complication

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French complication, from Latin complicatio, complicationem. Morphologically complicate +‎ -ion

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌkɒm.plɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˌkɑm.pləˈkeɪ.ʃən/, /ˌkɑm.plɪˈkeɪ.ʃən/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃən
• Hyphenation: com‧pli‧ca‧tion

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

Noun

complication (countable and uncountable, plural complications)

1. The act or process of complicating.
2. The state of being complicated; intricate or confused relation of parts; complexity.
3. A person who doesn't fit in with the main scheme of things; an interloper.
4. (medicine) A disease or diseases, or adventitious circumstances or conditions, coexistent with and modifying a primary disease, but not necessarily connected with it.

   Coordinate terms: sequela, comorbidity

6. (horology) A feature beyond basic time display in a timepiece.

   Hypernym: bells and whistles

   • 2013, Stacy Perman, A Grand Complication: The Race to Build the World's Most Legendary Watch, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 35:

     Obsessed, he was after a watch that contained the greatest number of complications in the boldest combinations in the smallest space imaginable.

   • 2023 May 28, Brian Ng, “Is one of these students the next Breguet?”, in FT Weekend, HTSI, page 43:

     In their final year, each student must make their own watch with a complication—from a tourbillon to a chiming mode to having a date display.

7. (obsolete) A twisting or intertwining.
   • 1646, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica:

     the snaky complication in the Caduceus or rod of Hermes.

Derived terms

• decomplication
• overcomplication
• uncomplication

Translations

act of complicating

Arabic: تَعْقِيد m (taʕqīd) Hijazi Arabic: تَعْقِيد m (taʕgīd) Bulgarian: усложнение (bg) n (usložnenie), затруднение (bg) n (zatrudnenie) Catalan: complicació (ca) f French: complication (fr) f German: Komplikation (de) f Hungarian: bonyolítás (hu) Romanian: complicație (ro) f Russian: усложне́ние (ru) n (usložnénije), затрудне́ние (ru) n (zatrudnénije), осложне́ние (ru) n (osložnénije) Spanish: complicación f Swedish: komplikation (sv) c, förveckling (sv) c

the state of being complicated

Maori: kūrakuraku, powhiwhi, pīroiroitanga Polish: komplikacja (pl) f Romanian: complicație (ro) f Tagalog: kasalimuotan Ukrainian: скла́дність f (skládnistʹ)

(medicine)

Arabic: مُضَاعَفَة f (muḍāʕafa) Bulgarian: усложнение (bg) n (usložnenie) Catalan: complicació (ca) f Dutch: complicatie (nl) f French: complication (fr) f German: Komplikation (de) f Hebrew: סיבוך m (sibúkh) Hungarian: szövődmény (hu) Indonesian: komplikasi (id) Italian: complicazione (it) Maori: pōauautanga, pīroiroitanga Polish: komplikacja (pl) f, powikłanie (pl) n Portuguese: complicação (pt) Romanian: complicație (ro) f Russian: осложне́ние (ru) n (osložnénije) Spanish: complicación Swedish: svit (sv) c Tagalog: komplikasyon

feature beyond basic time display

German: Komplikation (de) f, Complication f Polish: komplikacja (pl) f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

Irish: (please verify) aimpléis f, (please verify) aimpléiseacht f

Further reading

• complication (medicine) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• complication (horology) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “complication”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “complication”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Anagrams

• accomplition

French

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin complicātiō. By surface analysis, compliquer +‎ -ation.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kɔ̃.pli.ka.sjɔ̃/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -sjɔ̃
• Homophone: complications
• Hyphenation: com‧pli‧ca‧tion

Noun

complication f (plural complications)

1. complication

See also

• complexification
• simplification

Further reading

• “complication”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Interlingua

Noun

complication (plural complicationes)

1. complication