Other forms: circulations
Circulation is the endless round trip of blood through the body. Poor circulation, the circulation of blood, restore circulation.
Blood leaves the heart, delivers oxygen and returns, and the whole loop takes about a minute. Poor circulation shows first in the hands and feet. Elsewhere, circulation is the number of copies a newspaper sells, which is the standard measure of its reach; and in a building, circulation is how people move through it. Note in circulation and out of circulation, meaning available and unavailable.
1nouncirculationThe round trip of blood through the body.
“The circulation takes about a minute to complete the whole loop.”
2nounnumberThe number of copies a publication sells.
“Circulation fell by about half in nine years.”
circulation is a moving round.
Latin circulatio comes from circulus, a small ring. William Harvey established the circulation of the blood in 1628, and every other sense of the word is a metaphor from his discovery.
Latin
circulatio
Middle English
circulacioun
English, today
circulation
From Middle English circulacioun, from Latin circulatio. Morphologically circulate + ion.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA