sustentation
Americannoun
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maintenance in being or activity; the sustaining of life through vital processes.
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provision with means or funds for upkeep.
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means of sustaining life; sustenance.
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of sustentation
1350–1400; Middle English < Latin sustentātiōn- (stem of sustentātiō ) an upholding, equivalent to sustentāt ( us ) (past participle of sustentāre, frequentative of sustinēre to sustain ) + -iōn- -ion
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.
Soon Premier Mussolini ascended this mighty sustentation, planted himself on an imperial-seeming musnud.
From Time Magazine Archive
The conditions of their sustentation and generation being given, which no difference of physical circumstances can render incredible, the race may, so far as we can see, go on forever.
From The Plurality of Worlds by Hitchcock, Edward
That in which this excellent knowledge produces knowledge and effects sustentation thereof, that is pure illusion, as known and sustained, therefore by the Supreme Lord duality is not illusorily imagined.
From The Sarva-Darsana-Samgraha Review of the Different Systems of Hindu Philosophy by Acharya, Madhava
We regard it as another law, that the distribution of the sustentation money entrusted to the Church should be a distribution, not discretionary, but fixed by definite enactment.
From Leading Articles on Various Subjects by Davidson, John
But the writer has perhaps learned to regard two glasses of meridian wine as but a moderate amount of sustentation.
From Dr. Wortle's School by Trollope, Anthony
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
