To make smaller or reduce in size, quantity, or degree; to diminish or lessen something.
From Old French 'amenuser,' from 'a-' (to) + 'menu' (small), derived from Latin 'minutus' meaning small. The meaning evolved from the literal sense of making something smaller to broader uses of reduction.
This word is a linguistic ghost—it was once common in English legal and everyday contexts but nearly disappeared by the 1800s. You might see it in Shakespeare or medieval documents, showing how languages constantly retire words even when they're perfectly logical.
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