The act of giving up or transferring something (like land, rights, or territory) to someone else, especially through a formal agreement.
From French cession, derived from Latin cessio. The word evolved to describe both the action of yielding and the thing that is yielded, becoming standard in diplomatic and legal contexts by the 16th century.
The Treaty of Paris (1783) that ended the American Revolution used cession repeatedly—France literally ceded Louisiana to Spain and then ceded it back, and understanding cessions is key to understanding how empires carved up the world.
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