A French administrative division roughly equivalent to a county or state, used in France and some French-speaking regions.
From French département, derived from départ (departure, division). The term was created during the French Revolution to replace older provincial names with a rational, numbered system of administrative divisions.
The French revolutionaries invented departments as part of their radical reorganization—instead of keeping old names like Provence or Brittany, they numbered them, but the people kept using old names anyway, showing how language resists even the most determined government redesigns.
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.