memento

See also: mémento

English

WOTD – 20 September 2007

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin mementō (“remember”), imperative form of meminī (“I remember”).

Pronunciation

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (AU):

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• Rhymes: -ɛntəʊ

Noun

memento (plural mementos or mementoes)

1. A keepsake; an object kept as a reminder of a place or event.

   I kept the shell as a memento of my visit to the seashore.

   • 2011 December 16, Denis Campbell, “Hospital staff 'lack skills to cope with dementia patients'”, in Guardian‎^[1]:

     Many hospitals have not taken simple steps to lessen the distress and confusion which dementia sufferers' often feel on being somewhere so unfamiliar – such as making signs large and easy to read, using colour schemes to help patients find their way around unfamiliar wards and not putting family mementoes such as photographs nearby.

Usage notes

• The spelling momento is so common that some references now no longer consider it a misspelling.

Synonyms

• keepsake
• souvenir
• (plural): memorabilia

Translations

a keepsake

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 紀念品／纪念品 (zh) (jìniànpǐn), 纪念品 (zh) (jìniànpǐn)

• Finnish: muisto (fi), muistoesine
• French: souvenir (fr)
• German: Andenken (de) n, Erinnerung (de) f, Mahnzeichen n
• Greek: ενθύμιο (el) n (enthýmio)
• Hungarian: mementó, emlékeztető (hu)
• Icelandic: minjagripur m, minningargripur m
• Irish: cuimhneachán m
• Italian: memento m, ricordo (it) m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Japanese: 記念品 (kinenhin)
• Korean: 기념품 (ko) (ginyeompum)
• Maori: manatunga
• Norwegian: minne (no) n
• Persian: یادگاری (fa) (yâdegâri), یادبود (fa) (yâdbud)
• Portuguese: lembrancinha f
• Russian: сувени́р (ru) m (suvenír)
• Scottish Gaelic: cuimhneachan m
• Turkish: andaç (tr), anı (tr), hatıra (tr), yadigâr (tr)

References

• “memento”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present. (usage note)

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Italian

Noun

memento m (plural mementi)

1. memento, keepsake
2. warning

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Latin

Verb

(deprecated template usage) mementō

1. second-person singular future active imperative of meminī - remember!

References

• memento in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

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Serbo-Croatian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /memento/
• Hyphenation: me‧men‧to

Noun

memento m (Cyrillic spelling мементо)

1. memento

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Spanish

Noun

memento m (plural mementos)

1. memento