dispatch.
To send (a shipment) with promptness.
Meaning & usage
To send (a shipment) with promptness.
To send (a person) away hastily.
To send (an important official message) promptly, by means of a diplomat or military officer.
To send (a journalist) to a place in order to report.
To dispose of speedily, as business; to execute quickly; to make a speedy end of; to finish; to perform.
To eat, especially quickly.
To rid; to free.
To destroy (someone or something) quickly and efficiently.
To defeat
To pass on for further processing, especially via a dispatch table (often with to).
To hurry.
To deprive.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from Spanish despachar and/or Italian dispacciare. Further etymology is uncertain. For first element des-, see dis-. Second element probably from either Vulgar Latin *pactāre (“to fasten"”), *pactiare or Latin -pedicāre (“to entrap, shackle”), from pedica, from pēs. Ultimately related to impeach through shared Latin root. The first known use in writing (in the past tense, spelled as dispached) is by Bishop Cuthbert Tunstall in 1517. This would be unusually early for a borrowing from a Romance language other than French, but Tunstall had studied in Italy and was Commissioner to Spain, so this word may have been borrowed through diplomatic circles. The alternative spelling despatch was introduced in Samuel Johnson's dictionary, probably by accident. Compare typologically deliver (for the meaning to bring or transport) (< Latin dē- + līberō).
A message sent quickly, as a shipment, a prompt settlement of a business, or an important official message sent by a diplomat, government official, military officer, etc.
The act of doing something quickly.
We must act with dispatch in this matter.
A mission by an emergency response service, typically involving attending to an emergency in the field.
The passing on of a message for further processing, especially through a dispatch table.
A dismissal.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from Spanish despachar and/or Italian dispacciare. Further etymology is uncertain. For first element des-, see dis-. Second element probably from either Vulgar Latin *pactāre (“to fasten"”), *pactiare or Latin -pedicāre (“to entrap, shackle”), from pedica, from pēs. Ultimately related to impeach through shared Latin root. The first known use in writing (in the past tense, spelled as dispached) is by Bishop Cuthbert Tunstall in 1517. This would be unusually early for a borrowing from a Romance language other than French, but Tunstall had studied in Italy and was Commissioner to Spain, so this word may have been borrowed through diplomatic circles. The alternative spelling despatch was introduced in Samuel Johnson's dictionary, probably by accident. Compare typologically deliver (for the meaning to bring or transport) (< Latin dē- + līberō).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.