abbreviation

noun8

1. •
   A shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase used to represent the whole, using omission of letters, and sometimes substitution of letters, or duplication of initial letters to signify plurality, including signs such as +, =, @.

   • Hants is an abbreviation of Hampshire.
2. •
   A notation used in music score to denote a direction, as pp or mf.
3. •
   One or more dashes through the stem of a note, dividing it respectively into quavers, semiquavers, demisemiquavers, or hemidemisemiquavers.
4. •
   Any convenient short form used as a substitution for an understood or inferred whole.

   • The phrase "civil rights" is an abbreviation for a whole complex of relationships. — 1946
5. •
   The result of shortening or reducing; abridgment.
6. •
   The process of abbreviating.
7. •
   Reduction to lower terms, as a fraction.
8. •
   Loss during evolution of the final stages of the ancestral ontogenetic pattern.