appurtenance

plural appurtenances · alternative dated appertainance · alternative obsolete appurtenaunce

1. That which appertains to something else; a belonging, accompaniment, adjunct, appendage, attribute, or accessory ; an addition.First known use c. 1300

   Indeed, that was as it should be; for she was only an appurtenance of my mattress, or self-acting bedstead on four castors.

   1879, Robert Louis Stevenson, “[Velay.] .”, in Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes, 1st American edition, Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC, page 17

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   The youngsters, not immediately within sight, seemed rather bright and desirable appurtenances than otherwise; the incidents of daily life were not without humorousness and jollity in their aspect there.

   1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume I, London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC, phase the first (The Maiden), page 36

   Duchess Meg soon forgot this unworthy wedding-gift, such was her rapture in the other, the so august, appurtenances of her new life. What with her fine silk gowns and farthingales, and her powder-closet, and the canopied bed she slept in—a bed bigger far than the room she had slept in with her sisters, and standing in a room far bigger than her father’s cottage [...]

   1911 October 26, Max Beerbohm, Zuleika Dobson, or, An Oxford Love Story, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: John Lane Company, published 1912, →OCLC

2. in pluralEquipment used for some specific task; gear.First known use late 14th c.

   A couple of hair gloves, with a flesh-brush, may be added to the toilet appurtenances.

   1876, Eliza Bisbee Duffey, Our Behaviour: A Manual of Etiquette and Dress of the Best American Society, Philadelphia

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   Araminta, come I'll talk ſeriouſly to you now, could you but ſee vvith my Eyes the buffoonry of one Scene of Addreſs, a Lover, ſet out with all his Equipage and Appurtenances; […]

   1693, Will[iam] Congreve, The Old Batchelour, a Comedy. […], London: […] Peter Buck, […], →OCLC, Act II, scene [ii], page 14

   Listening to these two old American alchemists one can better understand why Wendell Berry, an M.A. from Stanford and a full professor with tenure two days a week at the U of Kentucky, busts his butt the rest of the time farming with the same antiquated methods the land of his forefathers; there is a wisdom in our past that cannot be approached but with the past's appurtenances.

   1986, Ken Kesey, Demon Box, Viking Penguin, →ISBN, page 93

   In the case of the urban consumer of nature writing, of course, the mud is to be hosed off one's mental Range Rover immediately one lifts one's eyes from the page and gives silent thanks for the civilised appurtenances of hot yoga and flat whites.

   2013 July 6, Steven Poole, “Is our love of nature writing bourgeois escapism?”, in The Guardian

   These “millennials” are, without a doubt, the most narcissistic and hopeless cohort I have witnessed in my 35 long years on this stationary planet. Consider, first, their absurd sartorial appurtenances, such as leggings sewn with skinny girths.

   2014 August 2, Teddy Wayne, “A Parchment on Millennials”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

3. lawA subordinate interest in land which benefits a principal estate, which cannot be detached from or held separately to that estate; an appurtenant interest.

   It is well settled that a water right may pass with land as an appurtenance thereto, or as a parcel thereof.

   1908, Samuel Charles Wiel, Water Rights in the Western States, page 340

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   Also I will that anon after the said nine years after my decease determined that my said feoffees make estate of all the said manors, lands and tenements with the appurtenance to my next heir and to the heirs of his body lawfully begotten.

   2019, Michèle Schindler, Lovell our Dogge

   Synonyms: contenement

4. grammarA modifier that is appended or prepended to another word to coin a new word that expresses belonging.
5. The state or quality of being an appurtenance.

   A second father is Kurt Koffka for his principle of appurtenance that he expanded from motions to colors.

   2005, Jaan Valsiner, Heinz Werner and Developmental Science, page 262

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   Thus, these two characteristics — appurtenance and the lack of need for any act of acquisition - go together and depend upon each other; one is merely looking at different facets of the same thing.

   1970, United States. Congress. Senate. Interior and Insular Affairs, Outer Continental Shelf, page 275