solicitation
Americannoun
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solicitations
plural
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the act of soliciting.
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entreaty, urging, or importunity; a petition or request.
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enticement or allurement.
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Law.
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the crime of asking another to commit or to aid in a crime.
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the act of a prostitute soliciting in a public place.
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Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of solicitation
First recorded in 1485–95; from Latin sollicitātiōn-, stem of sollicitātiō, from sollicitāt(us) “agitated, worried” (past participle of sollicitāre “to excite, agitate, worry”; see solicit) + -iō -ion
Explanation
Solicitation is a request for something, usually money. If you buy a fancy new house, expect a phone call from the local charity with a solicitation for a donation. Solicitation comes from solicit, which means "to request," or "to entreat." So solicitation is the act of requesting. There are three kinds of solicitation. One is asking for money, like when someone goes door-to-door trying to collect money for a cause. In law, solicitation means encouraging someone to commit a crime. Solicitation can also mean making a plea to someone with power to grant a request or favor, like your solicitation to the traffic judge to dismiss your ticket.
Vocabulary lists containing solicitation
Franklin D. Roosevelt, "A Date That Will Live In Infamy" (1941)
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The Awakening
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This Week In Words: Current Events Vocab for January 2–8, 2021
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The solicitation continues the U.S.’s planned 172-million-barrel contribution to a coordinated 400-million-barrel release by International Energy Agency member countries, with deliveries under the latest awards scheduled for November and December.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 30, 2026
The agency will also issue an open solicitation for Moon Base technology demonstrations and begin pursuing a lunar communication and navigation relay constellation to improve communications between infrastructure on the Moon and Earth.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 14, 2026
Burach says she was outraged and, as such, wrote to departmental leadership to share her patient’s feedback about how targeted solicitation felt “creepy.”
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 24, 2026
That action was in response to news that an internal investigation at Prudential had found “multiple inappropriate cases involving improper investment solicitation and the like by current and former employees” within its Japan operations.
From Barron's ● May 4, 2026
They played a duet from “Zampa,” and at the earnest solicitation of every one present followed it with the overture to “The Poet and the Peasant.”
From "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin
A program in Brooklyn pitches parents with solicitations saying “Worried about AI? Brooklyn Nature Days forest school classes are 100% human!”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 29, 2026
Such statements, Brennan added, were different from “corrupting private agreements and solicitations historically recognized as unprotected by the First Amendment.”
From Salon ● Sep. 15, 2026
"It cannot be stressed enough that peace and quiet is a right, and it is time to stop exposing consumers to unwanted solicitations," consumer advocacy group Que Choisir Ensemble, said in a statement.
From BBC ● Aug. 11, 2026
They also posted solicitations for the survey on X, aimed at researchers in these fields.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 14, 2024
This forced Androgeus to make use of daily solicitations to the king, by means of such as were related to him, or intimate with him, to divert his rage.
From Old English Chronicles by Various
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