Emily Dickinson Lexicon

SIG-NI-FI-CA'TION, n. [Fr. from L. significatio. See Signify.]

1. The act of making known, or of communicating ideas to another by signs or by words, by any thing that is understood, particularly by words. All speaking or signification of one's mind, implies an act or address of one man to another. – South.
2. Meaning; that which is understood to be intended by a sign, character, mark or word; that idea or sense of a sign, mark, word or expression which the person using it intends to convey, or that which men in general who use it, understand it to convey. The signification of words was originally arbitrary, and is dependent on usage. But when custom has annexed a certain sense to a letter or sound, or to a combination of letters or sounds, this sense is always to be considered the signification which the person using the word intends to communicate. So by custom, certain signs or gestures have a determined signification. Such is the fact also with figures, algebraic characters, &c.