Other forms: luncheons
A luncheon is a formal midday meal. A charity luncheon, the luncheon menu, an official luncheon.
It is lunch with speeches, and the word now appears almost only on invitations. Luncheon meat is the one common survival in ordinary speech, and luncheon vouchers were a British perk that ended in 2013.
1nounluncheonA formal midday meal.
“The mayor gave a luncheon for the visiting ambassadors at the town hall.”
luncheon is a meal.
Of unknown origin, perhaps related to lunch, itself perhaps from a word for a lump or chunk of food.
Built from
Of unknown origin. Possibly derived from an earlier lumpchin, lumpchen, a of lump (“chunk, parcel of food, lunch”), thus related to lunch. It is unclear which came first: whether lunch is a shortening of luncheon, or whether luncheon is an of lunch. Possibly also a dissimilatory form of or influenced by nuncheon (“light snack taken in the afternoon”). sausage is likely a an ellipsis of luncheon sausage,luncheon meat.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA